The story so far

This blog is about our travels, mostly in our motorhome, since 2003.  The motorhome is the best thing we ever bought and being retired we have the time to make the most of it. We travelled a lot in France with our children Eurocamping in the 70's but then stopped DIY style holidays in favour of jetting around until we bought 'The Twurp'.    

The first long trip after buying a motorhome in 2003 was to the west coast of Scotland and our first encounter with the dreaded midges. Then in 2004 inspired by reading 'Around Ireland with a Fridge' we did just that, but went round in the opposite direction! We enjoyed a fantastic spell of sunny weather for 4 of the weeks we were travelling from Rosslare to Dublin, the long way round the coast - magic.

We were really into motorhoming by now and planned a European 'pilgrimage' to Santiago de Compostela in Northern Spain in 2005. It was a great choice for a touring holiday and it got us into the 'aire habit' while driving thru France. The end of the world (well it was in days of old) on the south-western tip of Portugal  was our next destination in 2006. We started from Santander and returned via Gibraltar and some of the southern Costas, then back thru central France.

A trip to northern Italy and the Adriatic in 2007 was our next goal for some culture in Pisa, Florence and Venice with a detour into Croatia and Slovenia (Lake Bled is not to be missed). We stayed in 9 countries on this holiday. We changed the van in the summer of 2008 and only managed a short trip into Northern France meeting up with friends Mike and Margaret to introduce them to continental motorhoming.

2009, saw us heading back to see some of Portugal that we missed in 2006 and to rendevous with friends in northern Spain in order to drive back thru France together. This turned out to be a traumatic trip as Mike caught Legionaire's disease somewhere on the route back through France.      

A crossing to Santander was the start of out 2010 holiday in Spain with the Costa Brava and the Pyrenees as the main objective.  A fleeting visit to Andora allowed us to tick off yet another country.

In 2011 we traveled to Holland taking the ferry from Harwich. We spent 6 weeks away on this trip, 2 weeks of which was in Netherlands, mostly Zeeland, followed by 4 weeks around the Mosel, Rhine, Romantische Strasser and Black Forest regions of Germany.

It was a stay at home year in 2012 with 3 weeks spent in the southeast of England followed by a few short breaks. We normally just drive through Sussex and Kent on the way to the continental ferries so this was new ground for us.

Another year in the UK in 2013 with a 3 weeks in North Wales in early summer, Devon and Cornwall in the Autumn and a few more short breaks making about 10 weeks away in all.

In 2014 we returned to Ireland, retracing some of previous journey in the south but also allowing some time to try fly fishing in the Shannon Lochs of the midlands region.

It was back to Spain in 2015 with the objective of visiting Madrid, Segovia and Toledo with some of the other medieval towns around and about. Then some time on the Mediterranean coast before returning to Santander via Rioja region where we started.

2016 saw us take the Brittany ferry again, over the bay of Biscay, in order to drive from San Sebastion  in Northern Spain to Brittany. The route took us to La Rochelle and the three offshore islands Re, Oloron and Noirmoutiere on the Western coast of France. We returned from Roscoff to Plymouth for a change.