travelliing to Germany

hello there,
We intend driving our Symbol to Germany in September via Bruge and hopefully Luxemburg for a couple of weeks. We have looked up some sites but would be grateful to anyone who has done this trip for any tips/guidance you would care to share with us. Having travelled round France for a number of years have now felt the need for a change and know that thereare lots of you out there who are much more adventurous than us. None the less we will give it a whirl and see where we end up.
Many thanks for reading this.
Regrads
Jinny

Jinny,

A quick couple of notes for now as a regular visitor to Germany:

Luxemburg is great for cheap fuel. Just over the border there's usually a gaggle of filling stations provided just for that purpose.
In Germany we use the extensive network of stellplatze i.e. areas of car parks, often municipal perhaps outside a sports centre, where you are welcome to stop overnight. If you have a GPS then you can download all these for Germany and the rest of europe to it from [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Other than that, you'll find Germany one of the most motorhome-friendly countries in Europe. It's a great destination.


Bartfarst

Jinny,

We joined ACSI on our way through Holland to Germany in June.

I think it was about €15 which was a great investment for the cheap sites that we used in Holland and Germany and which we intend to use in France and Spain on our way south this Autumn.

On the other hand, the motorways in Europe are well served with service stations where you can stay overnight for free. We used a couple of them in Germany and never felt anything other than secure.

One tip. When we went along the A1 it was under repair for about 30% of its length! No major delays but a bit hairy at night as they use yellow sticky tape to show the temporary traffic lanes during the repairs; but leave the normal bright white line markings in place!!!

The yellow sticky tape had come off in a few places and more than once we went on a "best guess" basis as to where our lane was supposed to be. As we survived we must have made the correct choice!!

Best regards,

Ian

I definitely endorse Bartfast's suggestion to use the Bordatlas Stellplatze Guide. If you are GPS and computer averse you can buy the conventionally published edition either direct or, much simpler, from Amazon at just under £17. There used to be a CD included anyway to transfer locations to your Sat Nav. Like much of France many towns and villages provide a Motorhome(Reisemobil) stopover usually with decent facilities so it is aways worth enquiring locally if there is no entry in the book. In addition to the type of sites Bartfast mentioned you will find many conventional holiday/touring campsites listed, as well as Restaurant/Hotels where you can camp overnight for the price of a meal. The guide runs to over 500 pages with typically 8 entries per page. We all assume that most Germans speak good English but it should be remembered that East Germany's compulsory second language was Russian until the wall came down so the further East you go the more you should seek out the younger folk to communicate with if your own German is anything like mine. G

goldbunny wrote:hello there,
We intend driving our Symbol to Germany in September via Bruge and hopefully Luxemburg for a couple of weeks. We have looked up some sites but would be grateful to anyone who has done this trip for any tips/guidance you would care to share with us. Having travelled round France for a number of years have now felt the need for a change and know that thereare lots of you out there who are much more adventurous than us. None the less we will give it a whirl and see where we end up.
Many thanks for reading this.
Regrads
Jinny

We felt the same, and spent May 2011 in Germany. Worked our way along the North to the Baltic; then to Berlin (but stayed there with friends) then to the Hartz (superb) and Babmerg etc. Back via Brugge. If interested, I can give details of campsites - used the CC's book.
Cymro

grasscutter wrote:I definitely endorse Bartfast's suggestion to use the Bordatlas Stellplatze Guide. If you are GPS and computer averse you can buy the conventionally published edition either direct or, much simpler, from Amazon at just under £17. There used to be a CD included anyway to transfer locations to your Sat Nav.

Before I left on my current trek I tried the TT download for Stellplatz off the Bordatlas site but couldn't get it to install for some reason. They also do one for MS Autoroute which would have proved useful but couldn't even access that! The CD has to be the right choice so you can install it in your laptop but for some odd reason doesn't appear to be sold in UK. A German friend of mine I stayed with last week told me it is sold in Germany (usually at Autobahn Service stations), but I never found one.....not even a Stellplatz guide book! However I was only passing through Germany with the longest stop at Rugen before coming into Poland.

As for Camping sites I use the ACSI guide.....but not the book (don't even bother buying that!). I bought the CD off an ACSI inspector I met on a site in Germany three years ago and it is really good. Not only does it include full mapping (similar to Autoroute), there is a 'menu' of countries to select from so you can refine your search just to the one country you are touring. This then shows you every ACSI inspected site with full detail including the all important GPS co-ords.

Worth mentioning the prices displayed are pretty much a 'rough guide'.

As example the site i'm currently on in Poland is shown on the ACSI guide as €13 -15 where in fact i'm paying 47 zloty a night (£8.83), and that includes hook-up plus free showers.

In Germany I was paying as much as £14 a night without hook-up and 78 pence for a 5 minute shower!

We have spent some great times along the Mosel in September. The grape harvest is a chance to try local wines, in the sunshine

Another book worth considering is Camperstop. It does include other countries as well as Germany, but we find it a useful addition to ASCI, Bordatlas & All the Aires, for general European touring.
We have a Snooper sat nav, that has Asci & Bordatlas already downloaded on it, along with both the Caravan Club & Caravan & Camping Club sites also downloaded, so that might be worth considering as well?

As mentioned, it's worth driving through Luxembourg to find cheaper fuel, but it may not be worth going out of your way to get there, if you weren't intending to go that way.

Thank you all for taking the time to respond its very much appreciated.
Jinny

Bartfarst wrote:Jinny,

A quick couple of notes for now as a regular visitor to Germany:

Luxemburg is great for cheap fuel. Just over the border there's usually a gaggle of filling stations provided just for that purpose.

Bartfarst

Diesel was running at £1.36 a litre when I left UK 1st July.

In Germany I paid €1.49 (£1.17) a litre......and they think that's expensive!
In Poland i'm paying 5.60 zloty (£1.05), and there are stations selling at less than that as pump prices here tend to vary quite a bit.

For international fuel prices for June see the following link:

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Diesel in Lux in June is the equivalent of 96.9p per litre compared with 118.13p in France, 118.78p in Belgium and 115.3p in Germany.
An update for July should be out soon.

Bartfarst

If you're interested in meeting other motorcaravanners whilst in Germany, check-out Motorcaravan-Club STRASSENFÜCHSE e.V. We ran into the Munich chapter of this club, "The Road Foxes", in Landau in 2010 and they made us most welcome.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Bartfarst

Dago wrote:We have spent some great times along the Mosel in September. The grape harvest is a chance to try local wines, in the sunshine

Another book worth considering is Camperstop. It does include other countries as well as Germany, but we find it a useful addition to ASCI, Bordatlas & All the Aires, for general European touring.
We have a Snooper sat nav, that has Asci & Bordatlas already downloaded on it, along with both the Caravan Club & Caravan & Camping Club sites also downloaded, so that might be worth considering as well?

As mentioned, it's worth driving through Luxembourg to find cheaper fuel, but it may not be worth going out of your way to get there, if you weren't intending to go that way.

Hi I am very interested in your Stat Nav That has the ACSI & Bordatals Loaded Can you give me the model number? Petedaniel

Hi Petedaniel,

It is the Snooper S900 Ventura.

Loaded with ASCI, BordAtlas, Camperstop as well as both Caravan Club & Camping & caravan Club sites.

I think the price is around £290 - £300, but we find it very good, although being only a 4.5" screen may make it not so viewable as their 7" sisters, whilst driving.

Check out the internet to see what you can find

Dago

Very Interesting!

Having just had a look at the Snooper website, it seems they have a whole range of 2012 models now released.

Most interesting is the Ventura S2000N, which I was told back in 2010 was going out of production, so we were directed to the S900 new model.

As a direct comparison it has all the features of the S900, but also is Bluetooth enabled!!

And it's about £30 cheaper. Ouch