# Van Brian's Euro Trip 2014



## Whatton

So I've written it up again. This years trip. Lots of pics of food and campsites. If thats what you like then click on this and enjoy, if not then don't 

http://tge-thegreatescape.blogspot.co.uk/p/france-2014.html


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## bognormike

many thanks - very entertaining 8)


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## cabby

Now that sounds and looks like us, away to relax from the UK.

cabby


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## Gazzer

Very enjoyable read Nice photos especially the one above.


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## Kaytutt

Looks like a good trip, we're off for our first trip to France in three weeks time, deciding where to go is starting to blow my mind :roll:


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## Whatton

Kaytutt said:


> Looks like a good trip, we're off for our first trip to France in three weeks time, deciding where to go is starting to blow my mind :roll:


It is a big country but anywhere outside of the big cities is pleasant


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## Whatton

I've been asked about navigating and finding sites and aires so I'll reply here so as to share the way I do it, we're all different but this suits me and the way we like to travel. We normally plan each days destination the night before.

I have a small scale fold out map of France, it has half of France on each side. We decide on how long we want to drive for the next day. From experience the length of a pencil is 3 hours drive (no autoroutes) I lay the pencil with one end where we are and look at where the other end is, pointing it in the direction we want to go. I pick a town that looks suitable, on a river, near the green lined scenic roads etc.

I stick this towns name in my Garmin GPS and get it to route me there. On the Garmin are a set of Aire way-points and a set of camping site way-points. When its worked our the route to the town I check the travel time and distance, if it suits what we want to do then I go back into the "where to?" menu and select the option to find "near my destination" it will now look for waypoints near the town I chose.

I then go to the aires or the campsites collections and it brings a list up, with nearest to the town first. If we're looking for campsites then we always pick the first camping municipal and check how far the next is if its crap when we get there, options are always good. If it was aires we wanted then in the past I've looked the ones listed up in "all the aires" or "camperstop Europe" but this year used the Park4night app on my iPad. If the one we picked looks ok then I select it and ask the gps to route to it instead of the town.

This year I've also used the Copilot gps app on the iPad, we found it clearer to see, and chose better route and recalculated quicker if we went off route. What I did was leave the Garmin running the route as we drove with the volume off, but let the Copilot app guide us to just near the town, then turn the sound off on the Copilot and follow the Garm to the camping rather than the town centre where the Copilot app was taking us.

The wife normally follows the route on a really large scale Michelin road atlas, if she sees anyting on the route we want to see then we drop off the route to it, the gps recalculaes to get us back on route when we want to carry on.

As I say, this is how we do it, and it suits us, hope its of use to someone.


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## alexblack13

Brilliant, thanks...

We are very keen to get away and do similar. Down through portugal we think. Atlantic coast / national parks to just south of odemira. leave the van at my cuz's house n fly back..Home for a few weeks then fly back pick up the van and head off again..

I have the health issue to sort out 1st But his has not half raised an appetite!! 

Braw.. We will be off soon as.

Alex & carol Black


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## Whatton

Glad you all enjoyed reading it, your feedback makes it worth the effort to write it up.


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## Morphology

Nice blog, enjoyable read and thanks for posting the bit about route planning and navigation. We do something pretty similar though I have abandoned paper maps and the Tom Tom altogether in favour of Osmand on a tablet. SWMBO still sits with a paper map on her lap, and we tend to leave the choosing of final destination(s) until a lunch stop, when we can assess progress etc.

In addition to various POI sets on Osmand, I also have Archies app with offline maps (which separately identifies ACSI sites), ACSI Europe app (which has offline photos of ACSI sites) and the Campercontact (Motorhome Parkings) app, which has offline photos of Aires.

If we've got an Internet connection, then I'll also refer to Campingcar Infos.

I spent a merry half an hour finding the places you'd stayed - a couple of which I've nicked and added to my ever-expanding list of nice-looking aires and campsites that I'd like to stay at one day! 

The only places I couldn't identify were the expensive campsite in Spain on Thurs 24th, and that town in France on Sat 26th & Sunday 27th?


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