Visiting foreign cities

[Tony Jones]

Happy New Year everyone!

 

A few years ago, on a trip which took in several European countries, we hit on a useful idea when arriving in a strange city - especially for a day-visit while "passing through." It's simply this - MAKE FOR THE RAILWAY STATION!

That may sound strange behaviour for motorcaravanners, but what we've discovered is:

1) you can usually find it. Almost all cities signpost their principal stations clearly. And when you get there ...

2) you can usually park, and for a short stay it's often cheap or free. Now get out and go into the main building, where you'll nearly always find ...

3) a kiosk which will sell you a street-map, complete with locations of main attractions, and often free leaflets about some of them;

4) a cafe, where you can have a cheap, drinkable coffee (not counting UK) while you plan your "assault" on the city;

5) usable loos (again, not counting UK!).

 

Now you're ready to set out and enjoy all this new city has to offer! Of course, there are places where some of this doesn't work, but we've often found this approach saves us many frustrating hours of cruising around, randomly looking for any or all of the above.

 

So next time, why not "let the train (station) take the strain!"

 

All the best

Tony

[Guest Frank Wilkinson]

Brilliant advice! I've just received my first copy of Camperstop Europe and after just a quick glance I noticed that one or two recommended parking places were railway stations.

[Rayjsj]

:'( Shame that this isn't the case in the UK.

What perfect sense it makes..... guess thats why you cant do it here.

The 'original Park and Ride' scheme. Rayjsj

[Keith T]

Hi Frank

'Camperstop Europe'...what is this, and where can we obtain it. SOunds very useful.

We have an older copy of the French Camping Aires, also the French Campsites (really must update them both this year, I think!), but haven't come across the publication you name.

[Guest Frank Wilkinson]

Keith T - 2007-01-03 10:22 AM Hi Frank 'Camperstop Europe'...what is this, and where can we obtain it. SOunds very useful. We have an older copy of the French Camping Aires, also the French Campsites (really must update them both this year, I think!), but haven't come across the publication you name.

Keith, I learned about it through a post on this forum actually and I think that it's an excellent publication.

You can buy it from Vicarious Books - read all about it here: http://www.vicariousbooks.co.uk/

It covers most, if not all, of Europe, but I'm still going to buy the French Aires de Service book, which I've also been told about on this site, but I'm waiting for the 2007 version to come out in Spring.

[Keith T]

Frank

thanks for this. In fact Vicarious Books seem to be at Shepton Mallet show next weekend, so as we are already planning on visiting the show, we'll make sure we find their stall. Thanks, great help.

[dogmad]

What a brilliant idea Tony. In fact last Sept while on hols in France, we visited La Rochelle and failing to find a car park we came across the train station and parked there. It was very convenient for the harbour too.