Wheels Around Europe . . . . . . . : July 2018

Friday 13 July 2018

The last lap on our European trip

As our “Wheels Around Europe” trip reaches it`s conclusion, I am left with the memories of the wonderful places we have been lucky enough to have visited on our journey.

We`ve been away from home for eleven weeks and it has passed so incredibly fast I can barely believe it.

It has been a fantastic experience and I`m so pleased we made it happen.

These are a few of the highlights….

Germany

and the River Mosel Valley were a revelation to me. It is a very beautiful area with crisp clean fresh air to fill your lungs with, fabulous rolling countryside and spotlessly clean villages. More vineyards than you can shake a stick at, cycle / walk path galore, lots of culture, interesting places to visit and all within a days drive from Calais.

Looking back I wish we`d spent longer there but I`m sure we`ll be back.

Rhine Falls took your breath away, where the mighty Rhine drops off the Swiss Plateau and into Germany.

You could feel the force of the water in the rumble of the ground standing next to it.

Switzerland, well what can I say, just beautiful lakes, hills, mountains, and rivers, just perfect scenery.

The Italian Lakes did not disappoint, Maggorie, Come, Ieso and Garda all had lovely scenery and interesting towns. Peschiera del Garda is a great place but so busy, I wouldn`t like to be there peak season.

The Monte Baldo Hills were very scenic and welcome relief from the crowds of Peschiera.

Venice, everyone should visit Venice once in their lives if at all possible. It is an unforgettable city.

Croatia

gave us plenty of sunshine and beach time and we really enjoyed the Istria Peninsular. But probably not as much as our time on Krk with it`s crystal clear warm waters and friendly people.

The Plitvice National Park was also a definite highlight.

The images of those water falls will stay forever in my mind.

It was a shock leaving the warmth of Croatia and going into Slovenia.

We`d only travelled an hour from Croatia but the climate was completely different. Cool with a tendency for nightime thunderstorms.

That may not be typical I`m not sure.

It certainly wasn`t the last of the warmth, we did get good weather but it was a shock at the time after leaving Croatia.

Slovenia did warm up considerably later on.

The scenery in Slovenia made up for the odd bit of rain. It is a beautiful country. The Soca River and Lake Bohinj were amazing and I will always remember their beauty.

Austria was all I had expected from Alpine Scenery, culture and beautiful buildings. Salzburg is a lovely city definitely worth visiting.

So back into Germany and Bavaria is an amazing region with so much to see. The Romantic Route was very picturesque, Nordingden, Dinkesbuhl and Rothenburg ob der Tauber are lovely towns with an interesting history and so much to offer the visitor.

There were disappointments along the way of course, the low cloud and rain in Lauterbrunnen Swizerland, not going to Tuscany to see Florence and Pisa, missing Vienna and the city of Cologne that we found a little bit of a dull city.

The rain and cloud on the Grossglockner High Alpine Road was a real disappointment as I`d been looking forward to the scenery on that pass.

Louis distressed barking at thunderstorms was a definite low point too.

But overall it has been a fantastic trip I am so glad we have been able to make, the trip of a lifetime.

Ed the motorhome performed brilliantly. Sure there were niggles, the bathroom tap, the fridge, the headlight bulb and in recent days the leisure battery playing up

But nothing that can`t be easily fixed or worked around.

An update on the battery : I think the battery is ok now, after a good charge on hook up it seems to be working ok, so I`ll just monitor it and see how it goes.

Ed the motorhome has huffed and puffed his way up and down mountain passes, cruised the Autobhan`s, put up with terrible roads in Italy and Belgium.

Seen Audi and Mercedes fly past at warp factor three.

Been weighed by the police, had a narrow escape from a low bridge and has never missed a beat.

I`ve not even had to top up the engine oil level.

The only battle scars are a large stone chip on the front and a bent cycle rack caused by my careless reverse manouvering in Croatia, entirely my fault.

So I`m delighted by his reliability.

He`s going to be rewarded with a few days rest and an oil and filter change.

We have driven 4668 miles across 10 countries in 76 days.

Ed has drank 810 litres (178 gallons) of diesel.

So 26 mpg which I`m happy with.

To be honest it never varies much and the mountain passes don`t seem to have affected it.

We`ve used 47.66 litres of LPG for heating, hot water and cooking.

Including everything we have spent, the trip has cost £4482 or £59 per day which for the sights and experience we have enjoyed is pretty good value for money.

We now face the prospect of a return to a normal life living in a proper brick and tile house.

The home sick feeling began to kick in during the last few days and we were ready for our return.

Of course we have missed family and friends and it will be wonderful to get back to our usual routine.

I have a little time to catch up on the gardening before going back to work, but there`s no doubting it`s going to be a shock to the system.

Thanks for reading, I hope I haven`t bored you.

Time to start planning again maybe ……… ?

Now where`s my map...................................................................

The sand dunes of Calais

With the weather still cool damp and windy as we left Ostend and headed for a small town called Gravelines further along the coast in the hope the weather would buck up a bit and we could spend a little time on the beach.

No chance, so a walk around the town was all we could manage before it was back to Ed for a cuppa.

The end of the trip was turning a little flat due to the weather so we had to decide what to do, whether to change our tunnel booking for Friday.

I checked the website for Euro Tunnel, to change it for today would incur a heafty penalty, but we could change it to tomorrow, Thursday at no charge. So that is what we did.

I decided we would today head for Cite Europe. It is a huge shopping centre next to the Tunnel Terminal and has a motorhome overnight parking area. It`s right next door to the Police Station and reviews state it is as safe as anywhere, probably safer.

So a wander round the shops was the order of the day together with a supermarket visit.

For some reason the satellite dish couldn`t find the satellite which was a big problem with England playing Croatia in the World Cup semi final tonight.

A Dutch man nearby had no such problems but mine just didn`t want to know.

This called for drastic action.

I decided we would drive the short distance to the coast and try there.

We parked up, had a walk along the promenade and watched the ferries crossing the Channel.

I also got a satellite signal. Why it didn`t work at Cite Europe I`ve no idea.

So we sat amongst the sand dunes of Calais watching the football before driving back to Cite Europe for the night.

Gravelines Town

Gravelines Marina

Cite Europe

Calais Beach

Calais Sand Dunes

Tuesday 10 July 2018

Ostend

I`ve never been to Ostend before and was unsure what to expect.

I fact it is a typical British seaside type resort with all the bucket and spade and tourist shops you would expect to see.

The weather has turned cool and very windy today so a walk along the road was rather brief.

There looks to be a good tram system running along the promenade so we will try and get to see some of the other resorts along the coast.

Apart from that there`s not a lot to report, we`ve been on electric hook up so no power problems.

Tonight we are on Camping Astrid (GPS 51.24997 2.96857) It`s not really my type of site as it is huge, but importantly it has electric hook up so that`s enough to get a vote from us given our battery problems.
I think I have learnt on this trip that I definetely don`t like the large sites, but to some extent our hands have been tied rather due to us needing electric hook up firstly for the fridge and then this week because of the failed leisure battery.
Next time I will make sure we have the flexibility not to need to use the big sites which are a bit soulless.

We have just been watching the RAF fly past at Buckingham Palace, quite impressive, I`d love to have seen it live.

The bars in town today were busy with supporters getting ready for tonight`s match against their old enemy France.

Tomorrow we`ll see what the weather does, the forecast is better but if it looks like another cold windy day we may bring forward the return crossing.
We`re getting a bit home sick now, I think we`re ready to get back to normality.
Today has been a bit flat, just marking time and we`re not especially impressed with the region, probably because we have been spoilt with all the other wonderful places we`ve been to.

Monday 9 July 2018

Bruges …..Again

A more relaxing day was enjoyed in Belgium today, no near misses, no close shaves and nothing went wrong ~ so far

Maybe I spoke too soon !

I couldn`t post the blog last night as my data card had run out of data.

I managed to resolve that problem today by buying a local data sim, but it only has limited data so probably no photos until I can get some free wifi data.

The next problem is a bit more tricky to resolve. It looks like the leisure battery died last night after a couple of nights when it was looking a bit sickly.

The leisure battery powers things like the lights, water pump, water boiler and a few other things.

We woke this morning with no power at all, it had shut itself down overnight.

I was able to light the gas stove with a stick lighter so we didn`t miss the morning cuppa.

The power soon came back up as the sun rose in the morning sky and the solar panel began to stir into life generating electricity and charge the battery.

The difficulty maybe if it doesn`t holding the charge under load ?

Today we had planned to head for the coast at Ostende and have a few days by the seaside before our return crossing on Friday.

That changed with power problems, thoughts of bringing the crossing forward sprang to mind if we had no power and we`d need to get Louis his Vet check up done before we could travel.

So Louis Vet appointment was the priority.

Ringing around vets I was quoted 50 euro in Ghent, eek !!! that’s expensive.

I found one in Bruges that would do it for 20 euro, much more to my liking.

So, off to Bruges it was. The very friendly vet was easy to find and parking outside was plentiful.

So where to from here ? we decided to go back to the Aire in Bruges where I knew we could have electric hook up.

It`s where we started this journey 73 days ago, seven countries ago and 4,317 miles ago.

I even managed to park us on the same pitch, number 26 where we parked on that dark and rainy evening in April.

That day we could barely leave the motorhome for the rain coming down in stair rods.

So, it felt like we had come a full circle.

Except the weather is much better now.

We also bumped into Linda and Gordon that we had got talking to in Nordlingden in Germany so it was nice to catch up with them again.

They are on the Aire before catching their ferry tomorrow.

This afternoon we made the short walk through the park into the town and it was very very busy with tourists crowding the streets and filling the bars and restaurants to capacity.

It was quite a challenge just getting around with all the pedestrians, cyclists, horse and carts coming from every direction.

It is a very beautiful town though with some stunning buildings to photograph.

The chocolate shops though, well every other shop is an artisan chocolatier, there are far too many, there must be a lot of people eating the stuff to keep this lot open and in business.

Tomorrow, well I think we will head over to Ostende and then gradually make our way to Calais for Friday and hope we can get electric hook up along the way.

If we don`t we might find ourselves without power but what the heck, we`ll manage.

I won`t post many photos for now as I only have a limited amount of data and want to use it sparingly.

29th April 2018

9th July 2018

Ghent

A more relaxing day was enjoyed in Belgium today, no near misses, no close shaves and nothing went wrong ~ so far

We left Mechelen fairly early as we needed to get some water and dump the waste water as there were no facilities at the cinema parking.

It was a very peaceful night by the way, I'd expected it to be quite noisey but it was ok, just a little road noise this morning.

By morning the carpark was deserted apart from another motorhome and us.

I'd been reading up about the town last night and it seems Mechelen were pioneers in Belgium railways and by the 1930's had a good network of tracks going north and south.

Sadly it was this that attracted the attention of the Nazi's during the occupation and many thousands of Jew's that had been rounded up were sent to Mechelen before being transferred by rail to concentration camps.

There is a museum in the town to remember them but unfortunately it is closed at the moment.

We set off for Ghent and arrived on the free town Aire just before lunch.

It's situated just outside the town opposite the 2.3 km rowing lake so has great views. (GPS 51.04565 3.70328)

After lunch we walked into town, it was a bit further than Sue had hoped for, but was flat at least.

Ghent is quite picturesque with many fine buildings but, as seems to be a recurrent theme on the trip, the builders are also in town with their construction cranes, cabins, portaloos, vans and mechanical lifts. All taking up space and obscuring the view of the beautiful buildings on the canal waterfront in the centre of town. Talking to a waiter it seems there are two weeks of concerts and festivals starting next weekend. They're expecting 200k extra visitors. He's going to be a busy waiter.

It was sweltering today and Louis was feeling the effects as well as us.

We walked back at a very slow pace and sat outside to enjoy the views and cool off.

My data card in the midi has run out of data and I can't seem to top it up and efforts to buy a new one have failed so far.

Last night I used the cinema free WiFi but there are none available tonight so I will post when I can.

Beautiful Ghent waterfront with .... construction cranes !

Beautiful Ghent waterfront

Ghent Town

Ghent Rowing Lake

Saturday 7 July 2018

Not Happy in Belgium…… But the day got better !

I thought Italian roads were bad, but Belgium roads are much much worse !

We left Valkenburg aan de Geul this morning and our Lakeside parking spot.

The night was peaceful until some local youths turned up at 1230 and thought it was time for a game of football on the carpark !

It sounded like they were right next to us, but I suspect they were further away than it sounded. They did nothing untoward, just kicked the ball around a bit, laughed a bit, then drove off and left us to the peace that was there before.

A morning walk around the adjacent lake and park in the sunshine was a great way to start the day.

I also saw the Egyptian Goose again, this time with it`s partner and four chicks.

The sat nav was set for a town called Mechelen, west of Valkenburg aan de Geul.
It also holds what has been a strategic position in it`s history, mid way between Antwerp, 25 km to the north and Brussels, 25 km to the south.

I thought instead of taking the motorway, I`d select “avoid motorways” and enjoy a scenic route through the Belgium countryside, nothing so simple.

It started to go wrong when a main ring road was closed for roadworks.

I decided to follow the rest of the traffic that appeared to know where they were going.

All was well until a right turn at a roundabout down a slip road. Height Warning 2.9 metre ! Now I know how tall the motorhome is and I have a card with it written on to remind me, it`s 2.9 metre, but at that moment I had a brain freeze and carried on. Clatter, the top of the satellite dish (Folded down) struck another lightweight height barrier !!! you know the one to warn the muppets who ignore or don`t see the first one.

Then the low bridge loomed in front of me. It did look threatening and I decided I couldn`t take the risk, after all, the satellite dish was my only hope of seeing the England game later on and I didn`t fancy finding out how accurate Belgium road engineers are with a tape measure.

But where do I go, nothing for it but to reverse up the slip road.

Hazard flashers on and I begin reversing. Lets just say there were a few irate motorists around. To be fair to them they did cooperate and all was ok in the end and we ended up doing a tour of Maastrict to get back on track for Mechelen.

I`m sure the tailback I caused will have cleared by now as well !

The next annoyance was the dreadful state of Belgium roads, what I`d hoped would be a pleasant drive, turned out to be a proper filling rattler.

The roads were mostly concrete and lumpy uneven concrete at that.

By the time we reached Mechelen we`d had enough of Belgium roads, never again whilst in Belgium will I select “avoid motorways”

We reached the motorhome Aire in Mechelen only to find a concert type arena set up in it`s place. Fortunately the adjacent Multi screen cinema has stood in as an alternative, so that`s where we are tonight.

Thankfully there is no sign of an all night rave at the arena.

So a bit of a traumatic day to get here.

On the upside, someone, presumably the town Council, provide a free shuttle bus service from the Cinema carpark down to the town about 1.5 km away. Every 10 minutes a mini bus arrives and whisks folk down to the town.

It`s a much bigger town than I`d expected with lots of shops and restaurants and some quite impressive historic buildings.
Unfortunately there was a fair set up in the main square so this impeded photo opportunities.

The good news is the satellite dish seems to have survived the days events and has shown no signs of damage from the collision with the height barrier and worked perfectly for the England match.

A pair of Egyptian Geese and four chicks, they were really noisey !

My walk this morning

Mechelen Town

Mechelen Town Saint Rumbold`s Cathedral

Mechelen Town

Zorbing at the town fair

Mechelen Town - There`s an interesting building there somewhere

Mechelen Town Courtyard

Mechelen Town - Courtyard

Mechelen Town

Satellite dish working despite today`s collision

Friday 6 July 2018

Fully booked in Valkenburg aan de Geul

After the disappointment that Cologne left us with, we departed this morning and our journey through the suburbs did little to change our opinion of the city I`m afraid.

Mile upon mile of rather scruffy mixed commercial, residential, industrial, College and University landscapes that left me feeling slightly cold.

We had set the sat nav for due west and a small town by the name of Valkenburg aan de Geul in a little bit of the Netherlands that sits squeezed in between Germany and Belgium.

I had no idea what to expect but it turns out to be a very attractive little town that has been the holiday playground for well to do Netherlanders since the 19th century.

Tourists are clearly well catered for with numerous bars and restaurants in the town, loads of hotels, two theme parks, castle ruins, a cable car and much more.

When I realised how popular the place clearly is, I had doubts we would find space on the campsite I`d selected and those thoughts were realised. “sorry fully booked”
Oh well, motorhomers always have an alternative option they can fall back on.

This is the first time on this trip we have been told somewhere is fully booked, so I think we have done pretty well.

The first week of July is peak season with continental schools on holiday now so we weren`t really surprised.

We had struggled to find a supermarket in the town, apart from an Aldi that was discounted because the carpark looked rather tight, but when we failed to find an alternative we returned and nudged our way on.

Driving around town looking for a supermarket, we had got to know the layout quite well. We parked up on a car park and had some lunch before setting off on foot to explore the town.

It`s clearly a very prosperous town that has done well from it`s tourist industry. The locally quarried honey coloured stone used for construction of many buildings gives the town a very attractive appearance, similar to the stone used in Cotswold villages.

By late afternoon we`d seen the town and decided we would park for the night on a very spacious carpark by the Lake. It`s a very peaceful setting with just a couple of tour coaches for company. I`m not sure if they`re here for the night or not.

A few dog walkers come and go and there are some men fishing on the lake, after that it`s just the ducks, swans and us.

So a free night, the Continent is so much more welcoming to motorhomes than the UK.

I`m so glad we have been lucky enough to find Valkenburg aan de Geul and spend a little time here, it really is a gem of a place and one I`d happily return to if I ever find myself in this region again.