Happier times

My favourite picture of the camper, we'd just spent the night on the top of the nuffenen mountain in Switzerland, we were booked into a camp site in the black forest in Germany for 8 days, a mistake I'll not make again, as we had to be back before 10 at night to get in the site, and this restricted the distance we could travel in a day, so Saturday night we decided we wouldn't make it back in time, to carried on further into Switzerland, went through the St Gotthard tunnel (almost 17 kilometres long), then we drove up the mountain pass of the mountain we had just driven under,

After that we looked for the nearest highest mountain, and proceeded to drive up it, and that's where we spent the night,

Yes, that sign really does say 2478 meters, we were over 8000 feet high, (my watch recorded a height of 8300 feet, and a temperature of minus 5 when I went out to get this picture), it was a lovely place to spend the night, and totally free.

It was the middle of September at the time, and we were travelling around Europe, did about 3500 miles, and travelled through France, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Lichtenstein, and Belgium, and did it in 12 days,
We drove down to Dover first, caught the 04:30 sailing to Zeebrugge after kipping on the dock side (it's free, just follow the signs for the quay front I think, and there's free authorised parking for motorhomes at night. pay during the day), Arrived in Belgium at 09:30 local time, and drove to Luxembourg where we stayed the night on a campsite, and filled up with diesel at 42 pence per litre, then drove to Titisee, in the Black forest area of southern Germany, booked into a camp site on the banks of the lake titisee for 8 nights, the next day we drove into Switzerland, and spend the night on the top of the mountain mentioned, next day we drove into Italy, and went to Milan (toll road, cost me 1euro for about 100 miles, and they want 6 quid for a van on that 27 mile toll road round Birmingham!), After seeing Milan we went back into Switzerland, and headed to Lichtenstein, then back to the camp site at Titisee,
Then we just drove about in Germany really, went to the zeppelin museum at lake Constance, took a ferry back across the lake to cut 2 hours of driving, the camper was just with in the car rates.. by about 5 millimetres! went to Europa Park in Germany.. makes Alton towers look like a kids play park!, and when the time was up in Titisee, we headed back to Luxembourg for more cheap diesel, filled the gas tank up for 3 quid (costs 12 over here), called in at six flags theme park in Belgium, and that night went to the aqua waliby water park.. massive and very cool swimming pool/rapids ride/multiple flumes/donut rides/solarium/massive hot tub/spa baths etc,

Then we headed towards Zeebrugge, calling in at another little theme park near the coast of Belgium, one double loop rollercoaster, and a few smaller rides, but Vicky got me on the rollercoaster, first time I ever went on one that went upside down, it was brilliant, and you can't keep me off them now :) Then spent the night on a free municipal camp site just outside Oostende, and caught the 11:30 ferry home.

This is the camper on the site in Titisee, left is the van on the pitch, and the middle and right photo are the views out of the vans door.

The views we had as we left the mountain, the clouds were just beginning to rise upto us, the road was pretty steep on the way up, it was worse going down, and being in the Swiss mountains in the morning, we passed a few cows going to be milked, this one decided to moo at us :)

At europa park, massive rollercoaster behind the van, that's Vicky posing in this shot, it was a very hot day and she got a bit sunburnt, middle picture was the euro MIR rollercoaster, I loved that one, starts inside the largest round tower, and you get transported to the top around a space rocket, the rollercoaster cars rotate as you go up, at the top you gently spiral round the 3 mirrored towers, the cars rotate as it does this, then they lock and you take pot luck to if you facing forwards or backwards when you go down the first drop, then they rotate again, and you go another drop and a photo, the whole thing takes about 5 minutes, and it totally themed, the operators wear space station type clothes, music is played through out the ride, and the queues were about 3 minutes at the most!, the last pic is of the massive stand up rollercoaster, only Vicky went on that one, it was enormous, that roof in the picture is a massive solar array, provides power for the park and excess that's sold back to the grid, European theme parks really know how to make the most of things.

We also went to a few wildlife parks in Germany, as you can guess they are nothing like our wildlife parks, these ones are fun, as well as the wildlife, there's a few big rides to keep you amused through out the day, right is Vicky coming down the toboggan bahn, you take a chairlift to the top of the big hill, passing loads of animals below like the stag in the picture, boars, deer, beavers etc, at the top you can walk back down, or get a toboggan down, you can guess which route we took each time, also was an electric toboggan bahn, if you've ever played a game called S.T.U.N runner at the arcades, it was a real life version of that!, can't imagine it being allowed in the Uk, as we have control over the speed we do, you'd expect gangs of youths to try and crash the cars on the track over here, it was all unsupervised over there, someone to pay if you were paying for each ride, (we had passes to bypass the pay desk, free with the schwartswald card we bought from the tourist information point a few days earlier) then your on your own! there was also a massive suspension bridge that they had just put in, and a few other rides, as well as all the wildlife, even dispensers for carrots and stuff for the animals, this ones called stienwassen park, go there if your in the area, but get the Swartzwald card from a tourist info office first, it gets you free unlimited ride passes at this park and about 70 other attractions through out the black forest, and is a lot cheaper than entry to just 2 attractions.