5th December

I leave Padova today, I'm heading off to San Marino. I decide not to take the autostrada as I'm not feeling strong enough to take on the toll booths single handed.

It's still raining, although it clears later on. San Marino is beautiful, its surrounding countryside is more like you see in the travel brochures, beautiful Italian landscapes with an occasional "perche village" dotted here and there. Yes I know its French but I don’t know the Italian term for the equivalent.

When we (Grover and I!) started to climb, we started to go up and up on increasingly dangerous roads which were no more than the width of a car! plus many parts of it had great tree roots sticking up through the tarmac, I kid you not, that had obviously been there for years, but over a two mile stretch and 150 metres apart on both sides of the road they were advising you of the problem - with brand new road signs!

Presumably it is cheaper to provide signs than repair the road! This was typical in Italy. The same road when it got to San Marino was perfection in its construction, it even had much needed crash barriers.

Another problem I am having is with the AA Europe camp site guide. Iv'e got a brand new copy but there are so many errors in it! and only here in Italy. This site in San Marino isn't in San Marino proper, but in one of the outlying regions called Serravalle, so Tom Tom can’t find it. When I put in Serravale it found it straight away. Letter to AA on return!

Neither does it appear in Rogers Europe, yet it is open all year and is a magnificent site high in a wooded valley overlooking the plains below. It was sunny when I arrived, but in the morning a dense fog that did not lift by lunchtime which was a pity as the ristorante and beer garden were superb! the food was great quality and value but I need the sun, so of we go.

4th December

At Padova I book into the hotel Ibis for two nights, I need to sort out my IT problems with broadband as it won’t work.

UK Online won't work, nor will skype so I changed to all possible suppliers in Italy all too slow, won’t work so I'll be having stiff words with T-mobile when I get home.

It works OK on the campsite wi-fi, but not on the road. I also need to have a hot bath & 'chill out', that's James speak for doing bugger all!

I need to write out and post my xmas cards, send postcards, rewrite all the computer instructions Elly gave me (which runs to three volumes to date - lets hear “computers are simple to operate really” if i say it enough times i might believe it).

But at the moment it's the one thing that's causing me severe stress on this holiday! I also need to re-write and standardise my three address books. Yes I know it's sad, but paperwork is a comfort zone. I even miss doing James books!

I was going to go to Venice tomorrow but it's closed. St Marks square being amongst the others that are currently flooded, not surprising as the two nights I've spent in Padova 30km away, its been nothing but torrential non stop rain.

Never mind it smells anyway!

Leaving Lake Garda

Left lake Garda, such a vast lake with lofty mountains, like on the bags of flour (or used to be).

The Journey to Verona took me along the motorway, something I’d done before on this trip only to find an anomaly in the motorway tool booth system.

Approach 3 lanes toward booths 1 red light showing, two green lights showing, so far so good. One of the lanes is telepass automatic billing, so the other lane is me.

Simple says biglhetti ticket to you and shows flowing cash symbol as well as credit payments.

Well nobody's in the booth so I can’t pay with cash, it does not dispense tickets and wants me to pay with my credit card for 60 cents! which is stowed away in the black pig.

I bang the bell for assistance and they rattle away at a hundred knots. I explain that I speak no Italiano, and the Italian woman comes on at me with higher decibels, which grates so I lean on the van - I’ve got all day! (unlike the ten or so behind me who are honking like mad the man two cars behind, who asks if he can help he’s German!)

I explain the problem, he bellows down the speaker "ticket issued" and he explains the minimum charge. They should have the cash booth open but the man probably has not come to work, and no cover! all you will have to pay is 60 cents at the post office. Ok, so off I go, but I've not gone 4 miles when there is a traffic accident - a lorry shed it's load on the motorway, so we were diverted back onto the motorway I’d just come off of, and of course I'm faced with the same problem! only this time the same Italians are looking out of the booth and pointing at the British reg.

I pull up and the ticket magically comes out as before. I shout mille grazie they all wave!

When I want to come 100km later they're in a ticket booth but not for my tickets so I go through the staggered telepass barrier, the only other available option and park up across 3 lanes of traffic. They won't come to you so they just stand there in the hi visibility jackets posing, so I go over and show him my two tickets, pay 20 euros and try to explain the problem. I need to pay motorway charges i.e. just been on but he waves me away like Il duce, 12 euros saved. You couldn't make it up if you tried.

Reach Verona, see the opera house, I take a look in but no Egyptians at home, so I took a few photos.

I also parked wrongly apparently, carabinere shouting "automobile non furgone" which fortunately I knew, so I buggered off quick but couldn't find a campsite nearby so went to Padova to stay the night.

Wednesday 3rd December

I arrive at the lake garda site, by lake shore. The scenery is beyond belief and the lake water is clear and pure, so I go in for paddle. It's freezing but refreshing. The site is 27 hectares of olive groves!

I was content just to sit the by the shore for a while, and just relax and enjoy life and the views and the first bit of sun I've had for days.

I book in to the site and there is nobody else there. Choose a fantastic spot, set up camp, have a brew but wait - there is a problem with the electrics.

Holy shit it must be me, I think - but I cant solve it, so I have to get the owner to sort it out, and of course it's dead simple (if your Italian but I'm not - simple that is, though I do wonder at times) I'm British.

It was one of those moments, like when having searched Asda for an hour and can't find something you want knowing that when you find an assistant they are going to point directly behind you doh! As Homer would say.

Sure enough that’s what happened I tried every available way, six sockets no power, flicked other secondary switches nothing, and I've done an electrical wiring course at college!

Angelo (for that was his name) and who speaks good English, says it is my fault because it is so simple you just have to apply the correct logic, which is Italian logic. I failed because I tried to apply British logic he said "to an Italian it would be no problem, he would just do this" and he solves the problem.

We return to the bar where I found him and I have to buy the drinks because I had not thought the problem through and applied the correct logic. I Can’t help thinking I’ve got this wrong somehow, and yet I’m still paying at the bar.

I love the Italians as a race, although I strongly object to the childish and petulant road manners. I think the expression "the bigger the car the smaller the dick" was invented for them. Also they provide a third kind of logic they present to the world .

Usually we have two types, the first two;

Mens logic
Womens logic
Italians logic

However back to the Italian logic re wiring, everywhere in the world red means danger, live, stop, or as a warning i.e. traffic light

Green means go

I have an rcd trip in my van which lights up when a connection is made, all systems go. I got nothing, what I should have done - applying Italian logic was to throw the main master board switch we have at home onto the red position which plainly in English said off, when logic - British style that is, would not touch it anyway and because the green switches plainly said on, again in English telling me I had power so it did not touch them. Plainly my fault.

However because of it I had a good laugh with the locals at my expense after Angelo explained my British logic to them.

And so to bed tomorrow I'm going to call in at Verona to see the Coliseum /opera house.

Tuesday 2nd December

Klausen/chuisa is a small medieval market town. I went into town to have a drink and a panini and a coffee, it was only six but I wanted to take a look around, so I walked in through the snow.

A moment to share with someone but I couldn't take Grover with me, as much as he wanted to come. I mean, what would you think if you had seen me walking down the road with a blue hairy muppet? (sorry he’s watching got to be so careful he takes offence so easily) well what would you think? Bed early, up early and off to lake garda.

Monday 1st December

Off to the Italian tyrol to a place called Klausen if you’re German or Chuisa if you’re Italian same place, moving borders.

Woke early this morning and decided I’d drive through Switzerland and Austria in one hit, just in case the weather got worse. Good decision I have not made many in my life but this was one of them {good I mean not decisions}.

The whole journey up through the passes culminating in the Brenner was a fantastically beautiful sight, we climbed and climbed till we could climb no more and came to a halt when the snow had blocked the road and they were forming up a convoy to take us through.

I was at the front of this convoy but I’d rather have been at the back hiding!

Up the fast lane comes 3 giant Austrian made Steyr snow ploughs, we are formed up behind them and behind them 2 giant gritters, then us. Fortunately I had lost my place at the head of the queue, and of we trot quite sedately at first then a bit faster till god knows what speed we are doing, but its fast! I daren't look at my speedo because that would be dangerous! also I'm not sure I want to know. It’s not as if it is a sunny day, the weather conditions were horrific, dense fog and a dense snow blizzard all day.

I was genuinely frightened yet totally exhilarated at the same time, because of the speed and the danger, this went on for 22 miles when they pulled off and we were allowed to continue towards the Brenner tunnel. 7km long seemed pleasantly boring after our previous part of the journey, so how did I do it? Sheer grit and determination? no by continually playing the rap version of Roxanne by sting very loudly! that way I figured that travelling at that speed I wouldn’t hear the crash until I hit the back of the steyr snowplough, by which time it would as one of the other songs on the tape says: It would be too late.

Here is the snow plough we were following - doing 60MPH!:



I was going to stay at Brixen, but didn't quite get there as it was cut off by an avalanche blocking the exit of the motorway. The polizia stradale were very helpful though as everyone else seemed to know there was an avalanche at brixen except me.

They rang another site from my AA book and told the man there to expect me. When I got there he was stood by the side of the road waiting for me in the snow.

I’d like to know what they told him, perhaps that I was important but more likely a "mental i inglazi"

Free to go now!

Sunday 30th November

Arrive Lichtenstein after a long journey only to find it’s run by the Swiss , so zip up my pockets and get ready to repel boarders.

Lichtensteins main claim to fame which they boast proudly about though god knows why is that they manufacture and export 60% of the worlds false teeth.

A small country capital Vaduz, it has a gothic castle and very narrow attractive tidy streets rather spoiled unfortunately by the town centre, which is very bland and is full of horrible cube shaped obviously concrete buildings.

The sight itself was beautifully situated in a sound of music type valley but the site cost 32 Euros per night, and had a bar and restaurant which was closed - whereas in Freiburg it was 28 Euros for 2 nights and everything they wanted paying in Swiss francs so I lost out there.

Next problem. Every other country I have passed through has a blue universal clang type socket so big you could link up with an elephant with it. Not this lot.

I show them all the plugs I’ve got French two pin even a French reverse two pin, where the live and neutral wires are reversed illegal in the rest of Europe but not in France I’ve even got one for the RSA and Botswana.

No good they say, cannot have electric! they show me theirs, it’s like the French two pin but with three pins in the shape of an isosceles triangle? I get ratty as you do when they suddenly pull from a drawer the right connecter to link up to theirs which I can rent apparently so why have they not known what I have been talking about - especially when I have been stood in reception for 15 minutes with my own 30 yards of cable round my neck, I can’t have been the first to turn up with a caravan socket the rest of the world has. I bet David Livingstone never had a problem with his clang socket on his trip in Africa and what about humans what if they had different clang sockets fitted for ; no I’ll leave that for a moment this needs further development s in my thought processes.

Advance to my allocated sight number where there is a luxury electrical outdoor switching box I used to buy they are £450.00 each! open it up… empty.

Have to ask where I am going wrong, apart from being here - so they show me underneath the box at the back and open to the elements is the sockets for these 3 pin plugs of theirs, incredible why don’t they put the sockets in the box? Its empty otherwise.

Most people on the journey were helpful so far but these people just did not care, they had more Gallic shrugs than the French if that’s possible I’m sorry if I got ratty but its freezing cold, pitch black, snowing and nowhere else to go - and they just didn’t care!

28th and 29th November

Frieburg although only 150 miles from St Die the roads through Alsace are winding even though it is quite flat like Flanders but it is very beautiful though you can tell when you are leaving France and entering Germany by the condition of the roads and the housing stock where there’s a will there’s a way.

It’s like Alec Finlay when he came back from Germany after the war in 1950/1 telling us he could not believe the goods the Germans had the shops which were full to the gunnels with anything you could possibly want especially food which he said was incredibly well stocked with any food items you could possibly wish for basic or luxury whereas here we had just came out of rationing in 1950 (in Scotland).

I remember when I was 5 going round to the shop to get my weekly allowance of 2 ounces of Pontefract cakes (it was always Pontefract cakes) to be told no sweets this week , only fruit. What’s fruit says I, I’ll put in a bag he says so no one will see and don’t open it till you get home. it was a banana - never seen one before. People came from all around to see this banana - I didn’t like it cause the skin was hard so my parents had it nor did they explain it should be peeled either.

Hirzberg campsite is a model of Teutonic efficiency run by Herr & Frau Ziegler but as he did all the work and she was never seen by anyone we assumed she was a sleeping partner not in the sleeping beauty mould but more like rip van winkle.

He was very helpful very kind und korrect and everything done at great speed and much waving of the arms hence his camp residents nick name for him herr zig zagler.
Frieberg is a beautiful city with a fantastic cathedral with an amazing vaulted ceiling and totally heated throughout.

There are xmas lights everywhere, and a daily daytime market and two night markets plus an outdoor ice rink (small, and not as good as Edinburgh’s).

All the ancient buildings are beautifully maintained to a high degree Freiburg like Bristol was badly bombed during the war look at Bristol now by comparison, what do we do with our money?

Met up with a chap like myself, except his was an old library van, but he has done it up beautifully went to see the sights together he had been there two months so he knew his way around he was 70 and his wife died 6 years ago so on the road he went
It’s quite tiring raising and erecting your camp daily and dark by at 5pm so you don’t see much as you’d like, as campsites are closed mostly this time of year and those that are not are usually some 150 miles apart - and as I am avoiding motorways it involves a lot of long slow journey s and a shave and shower at night to avoid doing it in the morning as it is so bitterly cold.

As the weather is closing in southern Germany I have been advised to go south so I have decided to take his advice and avoid Stuttgart and Munich as if I get stuck on the other side of lake Konstanz or Bodensee then they will not let me through the Brenner or the tunnels without studded tyres or chains to get back into Italy. As it happened it was good advice and I was glad to have taken it though I thought he was being a bit over dramatic at the time.

The weather in Bavaria upon waking has turned so am reluctantly heading south indirectly through Lichtenstein to Bolzano in Italy going through Switzerland and Austria on the way.

I’ve had to make notes on most occasions as I go as it’s so cold the laptop wont fire up on battery power for long or can’t be arsed I’m not sure which, and biros don’t flow!

Never had this problem in sub tropical Somerset!

Frieburg - Black Forest:

Thursday 27th November

Up early, it was either that or hypothermia. Find another 2 foot of snow surrounding the van, make tea and ready brek which is quick and hot but if you spill it or sneeze it goes everywhere! bit like a mammoth with dandruff and then sticks everywhere :)

Set of for the Vosges mountains the French part arriving at St Die at a site called camping Vanne de Pierre.

Still snowing and very cold but the site was excellent, and although the restaurant was closed she made me a steak and salad with red wine which was superb so I had another but will admit to no more than that as some people will start counting so I will admit to no more than two. Bed at eight, late tonight.

Up early in the morning to Freiburg in the black forest in Germany.

Approaching St Die:

November 26th

Woke early, still raining. Set off for Luxembourg to Heiderscheid in the Ardennes to a campsite called Fuusskaul.

This is an absolutely superb site in the high Ardennes forest, very high in fact.
The journey the previous day was through dense fog and deep snow covering the fields as far as the eye could see, the roads themselves were beautifully clear even small side roads even though the snow was way over 3ft deep by the roadside (how come we can’t cope with 2 inches overnight?)

This site is 15 km past Bastogne, a popular spot for the Americans during the 1944 battle of the bulge (I’m still fighting it).

I’ve just come through these high roads and passes in a Volkswagen (admittedly not a Kubelwagen) how the Germans did it and nearly succeeded in the same weather as I had dense fog half light deep snow avoiding the roads and traversing deep, dense Ardennes forest was a high military achievement.

It was bitterly cold when I arrived at 4.15 - just in time to set up camp and make tea, when it was a pleasure to go to bed at 5.30 with a good book as it was pitch black, “advised not have food in wan as vild boars smelling it vill damage ze paintvork ja! “

Just leaving Charleroi - fog all day:



Lunch Stop:



Captain Grover made a friend:



Setting up camp in Ardennes





Pitch black at 5.30pm - time for bed:





Ardennes - off to the loo in a blizzard!

25th November 2008

Today’s the day it’s the 25th November 2008 and we're off.

When I say we I mean myself Laurence, then there is Grover who is a character from sesame street who I thought was actually called Georgina adk who is a girl and another character altogether again but my son assures me it’s called Grover and is male although there is no way of checking, trust me I’ve looked.

Then there is the black pig which is a 2005 Volkswagen transporter t30 tdi lwb.
Depart Dover 8am, weather in the channel is ok but in France and Belgium it rained heavily all day with gusto.

I was going to stay locally to visit Tyne cot Langemark [the German cemetery] and Ypres which I did but had to change clothes twice due to torrential rain.
When you arrive at these cemetery's you are suddenly aware of the enormity of the carnage of ww1. I am well read on the subject but it still did not prepare me for the mental and physical anguish your body has to go through on observing the row upon row of pristine white crosses unfolding in to the distance.

All I felt able to do was to stand in the pouring rain and cry quietly, it is all you can do. It is the only answer to the men lying there. It is the only sincere thing you can offer the soldiers is you’re tears and through your tears you’re respect. Words alone are not enough.

The same applies to Langemark.

Drove on Charleroi and stayed there overnight in a hotel needing to get things dry and the wet and cold from my bones.

There may be those of you who will have noticed that this is all in capital letters and apparently this is called shouting. Well that may be, but in the back of a van in failing light and sat cross legged like buddah, is not very comfortable, causes too many errors, and is stressful - I will apologise but point out its my laptop, my blog so there!

(added by Elly - I've edited this so it's NOT ALL SHOUTING!!)


Grovers new job - telling Dad to drive on the right!

My first post

Hi there, this is my first posting. Very soon I will be heading off around Europe in a van. I am a 63 year old single male and I'm about to have the adventure of a lifetime. My only companion is a Sesame street character called Grover who has travelled the world with my son and I before and he wanted to come so here he is (see photo) I thought it was a character female called Georgina Ad but apparently its Grover .
Come join me!