​Our Previous  Trips

November 2024

A trip to Namibia (for the second time) and then a few days in Botswana.
​Trip details to follow but here's a few photos

​
Picture
Gilroy with San bushmen
Picture
Hunting dogs

September 2023

Finally, we were able to make another trip to Japan, long delayed because of Covid and the country being closed to foreigners for a long period. This time though we visited Kyushu.

November 2019

Three week road trip through Namibia

April 2019

Uzbekistan - a bit far for our motorhome so an organised tour, though with the benefit of hindsight its a place you can visit independently.
​

October 2017

Non motorhome trip to Iran .

September/October 2016

Another  motorhome trip to Japan to cover those bits of Honshū we missed out two years ago. Japan2016

September 2015

September 2015 saw us spending three weeks in Northern Spain and Northern Portugal visiting places we had not managed to see over the last few years. We towed a car this time which meant that we could get into places that would have been difficult in a 7.5 metre motorhome.
​
Comillas, San Vicente de Barquera, Leon & Oveido in Spain and then the beautiful Tras as Montes in northern Portugal, the highlight of which was Parque Natural Montesinho with the sweet chestnut orchards and schist villages.

September - October 2014

We spent a month in Japan, we hired a small campervan from www.JapanCampers.com and stayed at Michi No Eki (roadside stations) which are safe and plentiful in Japan. We spent our time in central and southern Honshū.
Picture
Mount Fuji

November to May 2014

Picture
It's become something of a habit to spend the winter in Portugal and this year has been no different save that we have been able to pop home at regular intervals courtesy of Ryanair, leaving the motorhome on our pitch. As a result we have enjoyed two springs over the last twelve months, first Argentinian spring and then a Portuguese one.

September to October 2013

Picture
We joined an organised trip to Argentina.We left our van at home and hired a small one there.  5,000 kms travelled, lots of fabulous scenery, good food and interesting little towns. Read more by going to the Argentina page.
April to June 2013
PictureRiga
As our plan is to try and visit as many EU countries as we can, we chose to visit Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia,visiting Denmark on the way. We had no real idea about any of these countries and were pleasantly surprised and generally had a really enjoyable trip. We didn't see any other British motorhomes, although we heard that there may have been one or two there at the same time as us. We would heartily recommend a visit, especially Estonia which we thought was really good - relatively sophisticated, lots of English spoken  and lovely people.

December to March 2013

Picture
We avoided the very long hard winter of  northern europe by spending our time overwintering in Portugal, enjoying the mild weather, cheap drink and inexpensive food.
We were able to hire a car for less than 5 euro a day and enjoy some days out in the hills without worrying where to park the van.

Sept - November2012

Picture
At Le Puy en Velay medieval fete
We left UK early September and sauntered through France, ( visiting, Beaune, Langres, Le Puy en Velay, Albi) and then Spain (Haro Salamanca,Monfrague  and finally Portugal Elvas & Monseraz and finally the Algarve.


February - April  2012

Picture
Sheila enjoying NZ weather.
We rented a motorhome in New Zealand for some six weeks and managed to do both islands as well as a bungy jump each. Not only did it it get the need the "must visit New Zealand before the health insurance becomes astronomical" thoughts out of our system but we came to appreciate our own motorhome so much more after the miserable specimen we hired.

September 2011 - January 2012 

Picture
We have got into a routine of wintering in the Algarve and did the same this year. However we always like to take a different route there so this year we got  to visit  Burgos Segovia and surrounding area,  Mont St Michel  including watching a tidal bore and La Venise Verte (Coulon and Niort) as well as old favourites like Haro and Monfrague. We always end up near Tavira for a month or so but with Ryanair flights home from Faro.

September 2010 to March 2011

Picture
We spent the autumn in Spain Portugal and France and then after some time at home in January 2011 we went to Morocco. Click on the button below to read more about our trips to Morocco.
 

April - June 2010

We spent six weeks in Turkey - a long way through France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria but Turkey  is a wonderful place to visit and six weeks was not really enough time to see it all.
Click here to read more

January - February 2010

We spent six weeks in Morocco. This was our first visit and we shall probably go there again as it is a huge country and we still have a lot to see.

Once we got far enough south it was lovely and warm and we feel that we were lucky in choosing this particular time to visit Morocco rather than face the awful weather in europe this year.
Click here to read more about our trips to Morocco

September - December 2009

Despite only being motorhomers for three years our autumn trip has taken on a bit of a  routine in that we head for the Algarve in the autumn to get some more sun. This trip we spent a week or so in France, visiting friends, Futuroscope and some of the Loire chateaux (still lots more of those  to see on another trip) and then we headed into Spain. In Spain we travelled through the Pyrenees before reaching Tarragona for a few days beside the sea. After Tarragona we headed for Extramadura and then on to Portugal. We tried a new campsite this year near Tavira which is in the eastern Algarve, lovely facilities and a great location generally. Courtesy of nice Mr O'Leary of Ryanair we came home for a two week holiday in December before heading back to Faro to continue our adventures. We are hoping to get to Morocco in the New Year.

May - July 2009

We did over 4000 miles on this trip and after catching ferry to Calais we moved smartly through France Belgium and Germany before spending a few weeks in the Czech Republic then a week in Poland, a week in Slovakia before spending another three weeks in Hungary. From there we came home via Austria, Germany and France.  We found eastern Europe to be a delightful place - full of interesting people and places, we shall be going again.

 Generally travellling in a motorhome was not a problem, campsites and parking were plentiful, although eastern Slovakia was not so developed with campsites and this was problematic at times.
Click on the buttons below if you want to read more.

March - April 2009

We spent two weeks in France, visiting  World War 1 sites. With the poor exchange rate we wanted to economise on this trip and so we spent most of our stay in aires de service in northern France which provided overnight spaces for little or no fee.
Click on the button below to read more about this trip.

September - December 2008

This was our first long trip - 14 weeks in all. We spent a couple of weeks in France before moving on to Spain and then finally to Portugal for the last six weeks of our trip.

On this trip we combined stays on campsites with stays on the French Aires ( not the ones on the motorways but small ones in small towns and villages). Our journey took us to Blois   (for an overnighter but more interesting than expected   the Camargue  (for some birdwatching) and  Millau   (to have a look at the  bridge) Carcassonne (for its old walled city)   Mirepoix ( for its covered walkways)    Minerve (which we came across by chance and which was a  lovely  Cathar town)  in France . Barcelona  ( to see Gaudi )  Seville ( for the Alcazar) Ebro Delta ( for the birds)  Italica ( Roman ruins ) Guadix ( for the cave dwellings ) Donana ( birdwatching again)   Monfrague National Park   (more  birdwatching) Trujillo  in Spain . Evora ( unspoiled old town and chapel of bones and Armaceo de Pera in Portugal where we chilled in the sun.
If you want to read more click on the buttons below

April - June 2008.

This two month trip saw us go through France and into  Italy, we spent some time in Tuscany before moving on to Venice before heading to Croatia and Slovenia . On this trip we used the Channel Tunnel, which was fantastic and if you pick your travel times can be relatively inexpensive.Alternatively you can use your Tesco points.

January 2008

This trip was not in the motorhome but we visited Cordoba and the Alhambra and both are such great destinations,  they are on our Spain page.

October - December 2007

We took the ferry to Calais  and then drove  through France to northern Spain where we visited Santillana de Mar and Santiago de Compostella before heading for Portugal.Click here to see what we got up to in Spain 

In Portugal we went to Porto Lisbon Nazare Obidos before heading down to the Algarave. It was on this trip that we had planned to come back from Bilbao but bad weather cancelled the ferry. We won't be doing that again, we established that with  three days of reasonable driving ( ie not driving really long hours or after dark) we could get to Calais from the Algarve.

Click this button to read more about our trips to Portugal

September 2007

We upgraded our van in the summer of 2007 and so decided to give it a quick run by spending two weeks in Belgium and  Holland.

May - June 2007

As we say elsewhere on this site we do not know France well so on this trip we stayed in Burgundy. Lovely area and lovely campsites. See Burgundy for more info. This time we opted for Dover Calais ferry which is a more competitive route and the fares much cheaper than the ones to St Malo.

September 2006

September 2006 was when Sheila was meant to retire but being irreplaceable she was asked to stay on for a few months while a replacement was found. As  a result our first motorhome trip was  just for a couple of weeks when we took the ferry to St Malo and spent a happy time in Brittany.