Equipment

15
Jun
2026

Cologne Family Gathering

It was a good drive the 270 or so miles from Turckheim to a few kms south of Cologne, and by lucky chance I was doing it on a german bank holiday where most lorries are not allowed to be on the motorways. This meant that I could mostly drive at my preferred 58mph, well below any motorway speed limit in that country, on a two-lane road where legally the signs indicate lorries are not allowed to overtake. I had once or twice to use an exit slip lane to let a justifiably hacked-off lorry driver overtake, thereby getting him (it usually is) away from my van’s backside.

I had booked the Cologne City campsite as last year for Friday to Monday but it was fully booked for the Thursday. Park4Night happily had suggestions for road parking in a business park in the south of the city, so Blue found its place in front of a Volvo dealership and I cycled the 6km to my son & partner’s flat. The next day I did a first and rode pillion on my son’s Vespa, which he had gone to great bureaucratic lengths last year to import, to get back to the van to drive it to the campsite. The scooter, which he calls Terzaghi, has really found its purpose in the less rain, more conducive to vehicles and 2 wheels other than cars Manchester, Cologne. (I think I like this german method of more complex sentence construction). It’s used for all manner of quick journeys, which are longer than those done on his bikes. In the Netherlands, these can also be ridden on the bike paths! Car parking is the challenge in the city, so if you’ve managed to snaffle a space close by, you don’t want to move your car unless you really have to. And it’s honestly not necessary for anywhere within the city you might want to go – two legs, or two wheels get you everywhere, and if not, trams are fantastic. The flat is 10 mins walk to lovely parks, and to the Rhein river, as well as all the cafes/restaurants of a lively city. Bikes and scooters can be locked up and left in the tree-lined walkways in the middle of these old streets or many of the old apartment buildings have basement store rooms.

Having got the van happily ensconced in the campsite, I now cycled my e-bike with kid’s bike seat back to the flat to await the arrival of daughter and son-in-law plus granddaughter nearly 3, and grandson 6 months. I was also able to stay at the flat for the 3 nights on their sofa-bed with essential eye-mask, but had to be prepared for daddy to bring the baby into the living room from potentially 5am!! if he could not be settled, as is their usual modus operandi. Fortunately we had from around 5.30 – 7am across the 3 mornings, while the others slept on.

I had bought a child-seat for the Brompton, so the aim 🙄 was for us all to do a ‘lovely’ bike ride along the river on the Saturday. Whilst my granddaughter was perfectly happy now at her great age to sit on this and ride along, having been resistant at a younger age to the proper Thule bike seat, the 6-month old was also very frightened and unhappy to say the least, to sit on this latter for any length of time. Flexibility is the unavoidable name of the game. We ended up spending a couple of hours in the lovely nearby park, reassuring our little girl that there was nothing to be scared about by the man inconsiderately vacuuming up water and leaves out of the pedaloes near where we were sitting in the cafe for some lunch! Gardening equipment noise is also added to that of toilet hand-dryers on the list of threats.

Sunday’s nicer weather replacing changeable 17deg, the heatwave having been and gone, rewarded the risk taken in booking a few weeks prior quite an expensive trip to the nearby Phantasienland – Cologne’s Alton Towers equivalent. Would the children be ok for this with loud noise, lots of people etc etc, gulp? After a shaky start, things picked up. My granddaughter loved the toddler rides, the dragons walking round, the sun shone, queues not too long for the adult rides, and my primary job, not being a theme park fan, of looking after the baby, was just about managed. Not because he was unhappy, but because to keep him happy requires constant carrying, and he’s a bruiser. What he is most unhelpfully not happy about is for the most part sitting in the pram. I thought the park was absolutely fantastic – the set designs, rides, provision for toddlers, including a water park, plenty of staff keeping all of the place clean, lots of eateries with nice food. THANK GOODNESS a good time was had by all, given the money spent!

Monday was the grand depart with the hosts needing to be at their home-working desks for 8am virtual meetings. The logistics therefore involved first getting the spare bedroom vacated with all bags and gubbins moved into the living room, so that Jen’s working environment could be displaced from this into that, and Luke working in their bedroom for his early meetings. He then had time to  indispensably help with the great move of all stuff down the stairs to the pavement, as the flat is on the 3rd floor where the floors are double-height, no lift in these old buildings, and the car to be brought to as nearby as possible. I meanwhile had two bikes to get across the river to the campsite, with cycling obviating the need for a car journey to go right to the outskirts of the city so as to use one of the dual carriageway bridges over the Rhein.

A british person may have thought this preposterous and absolutely bonkers, but not a Cambodian or even particularly northern European city dweller.

Thanks & credit go to our wonderful hosts. They offered such welcoming hospitality to the invaders of their lovely dinky environment.

And so, off to the next stop with the family – a Eurocamp static on a campsite between the city of Leiden and the north sea.

Posted by Jackie in Equipment, Germany, Places, 1 comment
07
Oct
2025

Paris à Velo

Cycling the 5km to our Aparthotel Home & Break in the Porte de Choisy, Place d’Italie area south east from our arrival at Notre Dame, was a slightly uphill affair but continued our initial journey on different types of the Paris cycling infrastructure. Our room was on the 6th floor with small kitchenette including sink, fridge, microwave, kettle, very comfy beds, with enough space to take the bikes up to, preferring to do this and seek forgiveness after rather than be reliant on asking for a key from the often busy reception for their official bike store. This cost approx £360 for 4 nights, and absolutely met our needs with the exception of being pretty hot as the windows could only be unlocked by someone from reception on safety grounds, and the cool aircon having been switched off for the whole hotel given the autumn/winter season. Complete luxury nevertheless compared to the toilet requirements during the camping cold nights and deflating (expensive) mat which I forgot to mention previously. The area was a ‘China/East Asia’ town, so we enjoyed some Thai food one evening.

We loved our three days exploring, on now unladen bikes, many of the city’s sights in fantastic weather 🙂 including going into the cathedral, the Jardin des Plantes, the Bastille monument, Place de la Republique, the Bassin de La Villete, the Jardin du Luxembourg.

Bassin de la Villette

Always an enhancement to listen to some quality live music:

 

We even managed to meet up with my brother and cycling buddy who had cycled from Caen to the Mediterranean and training it back to the ferry had a 4 hour transfer time in Paris, so we cycled once again along the Seine and upto the Montmartre area and Sacre Coeur.

So that ticked two off of this trip’s aims – bikepacking with a tent & seeing more of Paris.  Re the latter, we didn’t cycle up the Champs Elysee, or along to the Eiffel Tower, nor the Tuileries or Louvre, and plenty more for next time.

But as for the cycling infrastructure – absolutely amazing.  I think every street or road we needed to use from the outskirts and throughout the centre had some absolutely clear provision or other for bikes. It seemed to me that cars definitely did not have priority, and even though I think their numbers have significantly diminished over the last years since the major push for cycling, walking and public transport, still they were caught in jams and could not compete with the efficiency and effectiveness of travel with 2 wheels. It took us some time to understand what we had to look for when it came to navigating intersections, as there was a variety of different cycle lane approaches, and traffic lights were not as responsive as they could be which imo leads to a significant amount of red-light jumping by cyclists.  One of the principles adopted in the Netherlands for cycling infrastructure design is to keep bikes moving and this was the approach adopted anyway by the majority of cyclists in Paris 🙂

There are loads of bike maps for Paris on the internet and youtube videos of how this really radical, significant change in such a relatively short time has occured, not least https://youtu.be/woFlJx7Rv78?si=JjZF3LBvfMjwcPVO  & Paris en Selle.

After 3 days we were ready for the return journey home getting the bikes on the train and travelling from Gare St Lazare to Rouen, then change to Dieppe. This did involve having to book the bikes onto the Rouen train, then hang them in the allotted place for the journey necessitating the removal of the paniers etc, and then have a somewhat stressful time doing the transfer to the Dieppe train in 10 minutes – the Paris train was thankfully on time. A tick for French trains so far.

We managed it, and arrived to rain in Dieppe and a short ride to the ferry port for the 6pm crossing back to the campervan and the journey to North Yorkshire.

A good ferry crossing again, despite the Storm Amy warnings for the north, and a good non-stop journey in the van. This was despite navigating the one-junction full closure of the M1 around Northampton, but absolutely helped by Greatest Hits 70s radio and additional sing-along by this first mate.

Would I do it again?  Yes for the bikepacking, trains etc, camping with the caveat of being in warmer climes and a mattress that doesn’t deflate in the night.

Last but not least – here’s the star of the show – ie my Brompton. Not particularly liking the field tracks or cobbles but managed the weight of all the stuff and the miles, and responded like a thoroughbred to the city.  The genuine face of delight on the rider trying it out for the first time says it all  🤣 🚴‍.

Posted by admin in Cities-Towns, Equipment, France, Musings, Places
06
Oct
2025

Bikepacking – who’d have thought

Almost 2 weeks ago a friend Nicola and I cycled our bikes onto a ferry to the continent for the first time, the actual culmination of July travel musings about bikepacking with my brompton – including camping, wanting to see what Paris had done with its cycling infrastructure, and spend more time in that city than the odd days in the previous decades as a stopover on the way to warmer climes in France.

My research turned up the Avenue Verte route from Dieppe to Paris and the tentative decision was made for a trip in September, weather dependent.  I used the Sustrans guide book and then the France Velotourisme site for this and all the other routes across the country.  Both good resources imo.

Over the next few weeks I assembled equipment, leading to the bike looking like this .

The weather forecast towards the selected time period was looking favourable, so we landed in Dieppe after a night-time drive in the campervan down to Newhaven, leaving it there in the port parking.

After a 4-hour pleasant ferry crossing, which I would recommend, we cycled in the sunshine to our first campsite in Arques-la-bataille a few kms along the route. Nothing had been booked apart from the Paris hotel, so we had ultimate flexibility to change or abandon the route and/or accommodation.

1st morning take down

We counted the first night as a success in that we managed to get some sleep, pack everything away and get it back onto the bikes. The tent, borrowed sleeping bag, thermal inner and ‘Trangia’ cooking set did the job, meaning cups of tea and porridge for breakfast. The campsite was very pleasant, including heated toilet block next to the pitch, as was the 30 miles of former railway line route the next day.

The weather started off bright and we enjoyed the landscapes and quick views of chateaux on route.

The gloom increased though and we stopped for a coffee or two to get out of the cold in Neufchatel-en-Bray, finally arriving in very low dark clouds and mist at the Forges-les-Eaux municipal campsite. These two sites were in their last week of opening, and felt it, and the latter had no heating in the toilet blocks. But of course very cheap. Bedtime was preferable to sitting outside in the cold and dark, so between 8 & 9pm by the time we’d done everything; the availability and usefulness of a picnic table and benches were recognised and used for sitting above the wet grass to cook, have food, and keep things dry from the dew while packing up the next morning.

The lack of rain and wind continued in day 3 thankfully, but we had decided to try and book ourselves into one of the two small hotels in the town of Gisors when we arrived, having cycled 40 miles including some long hill climbing. Beautiful route again.

Another highlight was meeting 4 guys from the UK also cycling to Paris at the almost top of one long climb, providing a lift for our spirits with good fun conversation and the very welcome gift of sweets.  I didn’t get immediately what they meant with their ‘spooning’ 🤣recommendation for keeping warm, but we pointed out that we more than happy to be in our own separate tents despite the cold. They did say that we could join them in their chambre d’hote as Nicola indicated we may have to crash their pad should we not find a hotel room, but it might not be pleasant spooning between the four, and putting up with their snoring. We didn’t need to gatecrash and had a wonderful nights sleep in a 2-star hotel after a lovely meal out in the centre of the small town.

We now had another planned 3 days of cycling and two nights of camping before getting to our booked Paris hotel. The weather forecast was looking good and the day started positively bumping into the 4 guys again who recommended a cafe which could meet one of Nicola’s romantic (not unreasonable altho’ for late September …) expectations of being able to sit in a small town square at a french cafe in the sun:)

So that we would only have to put up and pack up all the kit once more, and then enjoy a non-cycling day, we decided to combine two days cycling into one to reach the last campsite – a 4-star in the town of Maison Lafitte on the Seine, hopefully meaning heated toilet blocks, and a cafe/restaurant for a comfortable meal whiling away some evening time.  This meant 50 miles of cycling and abandoning some of the route’s tracks aross fields in favour of our own satnaving on quiet roads. It was a long day, sunny, no wind, but I at least was knackered and had had enough of being on the bike as the approach to the town seemed by now interminable.

The decision was a good one, the campsite was lovely but the pitches were without decent grass, having mainly been occupied by motorhomes over the season, so somewhat muddy, and no picnic table set up. Packing up, although in the sun, took quite a long time on the next but one morning, avoiding mud and dealing with the heavy dew and condensation. We enjoyed the restaurant evening meal and cafe the next morning.

Our grand Paris Entree was 30 miles of cycling along initially beautiful parts of the Seine, including through Rueil Malmaison, perhaps similar to places along the Thames, west of London.

The route then morphed into separate cycling provision along busy dual carriagways in very industrial logistics areas.  No cafes, McDs, or similar for a needed stop for quite a way. Thankfully the Komoot app navigation, into which I’d loaded a GPX file of the route performed a treat, and matched the regular Ave Verte signs at the key intersections. Back to tracking the Seine, we now cycled along the Saint Denis canal through the banlieus of the same and then Aubervilliers, both more deprived areas.  My phone having finally given up the ghost re power, we followed cycling signs to Notre Dame, the final destination of the route.

And we did it. 

 

With a celebratory french millefeuille for me.

 

We had reached the reality and luxury of a hotel base for 3 days of cycling exploration of the city and train journey back to Dieppe.  Next post to document this.

 

Posted by admin in Cities-Towns, Equipment, France, Places
21
Jun
2025

Into the Dolomites

I had yet to decide where I would head after Verona for the remainder of the trip making my way back upto Cologne and then to the Hook of Holland to Harwich ferry. The beauty of travelling out of season in a van particularly on the continent is that in most cases booking is not necessary so one can follow the weather, and change plans and directions.

One strong contender for inclusion at the outset were Salzburg and the Dolomites – a national park in the Italian Alps north of Verona and Venice – despite the fact that driving up into the mountains and then coming back down again was ‘not me’. Previous posts have made mention of this. In the end I settled on my initial ideas rather than avoiding mountains and heading even further east as Ljubljana and Vienna vied for contention, or west as I have missed France over the last 2 years.

Given a continuing very hot weather forecast I thought I would regroup and reset the van and equipment for single travel after 2 weeks of company at a campsite with cold water immersion potential. The not too far site Lago di Lago fitted the bill with what looked like a very inviting swimming pool and lake in the foothills of the mountains. Really beautiful area, small towns and villages, good roads, and a happy 2 days stay.

From there I set the satnav for Cortina di Ampezza, a ski resort at 1200m – the roads looked more ‘main’ and not too far. Lovely weather ongoing. Sailing along quite happily, one of those beeps occured with a warning message indicating a problem with the AdBlue system with instruction to consult the manual.  At the start of the trip, I had complied with the usual warning message re needing to top up the levels, so was surprised and abit concerned.  Pulled into a motorway service station, and the manual indicated to consult a main dealer for this!  I decided to add some more AB and was very happy to see the message disappear and remain so. Onwards and upwards.

At a major junction, where I was due to turn onto the main road heading upto Cortina, a roadwork man told me in his patchy English and then Italian that the road ahead was closed and I could reach the town via the Lake Misurina road. It’s unexpected scenarios like this which cause a build up of tiredness even on relatively short journeys, as in this case I’m in the middle of a roundabout holding up traffic from 3 directions trying to process this information taking into account my least comfort zone factors as quickly as possible. My ‘mountains are not quite me’ sensations were growing by the minute. Anyway, I continued according to the advice, the road up to the 1800m pass was very good and traffic trundled along at a ‘safe’ for me pace. So far so good. The descent was slow following a cycling club peloton, necessitating much braking. I did try to use my gears, but the incline was pretty steep. At a certain point I started to smell burning, hoped it wasn’t me, and decided to carry on as it was now only a few kilometres to the end.  Having finished the main descent and reached a junction in the town, the occupants of a car which had been following me all the way down, did seem to give me and/or the van a good stare as they overtook, adding to my concerns.

Camping Rocchetta was a further 2k downhill on the edge of the town, and I was very happy to finally get on my allocated pitch.  The front passenger wheel was indeed the culprit, with a lingering burning smell. All the others were ok. I was there for 2 nights and late afternoon on the 2nd day, following encouragement from some New Zealanders to ask Reception for a garage to get it checked, I drove to the garage who referred me to another. Despite the brakes needing to be applied on some steep but short descents, the smell had dissipated and not returned. Thankfully a mechanic could speak English, had a look at the wheel and the disc through the hub fixings and advised me that in his opinion it would be ok, and next time to really use the gearing. Intending to leave the next morning and come down to the valleys – to a bigger town, and hence more auto garages – via a more main road, I allowed myself to be reassured with what I had wanted to hear. Interesting that my fears had been about the roads, but they were ok and instead this time it was the van brakes.  Life is like a box of chocolates.

I love these upland meadows and wild flowers were still in evidence

I totally enjoyed the stay at the site, cycling and walking in the absolutely beautiful mountain landscape. A younger, fitter vibe was evident once again with walkers, mountain bikers and cycle-tourers in abundance. Cortina was undergoing major road and building works as it is co-hosting the 2025/26 winter olympics. Even though I only stayed in a small area of the Dolomites, I have been finally able to tick this box and see in real life why the images and accounts from other travellers had put them on my list.

 

Posted by admin in Equipment, Italy
27
May
2025

Maastricht, Leiden, Amsterdam

The sunshine and blue sky for the first 2 weeks painted everything gloriously!

Maastricht

I spent my first 2 nights a couple of kms or so outside of Maastricht, which I chose to visit as it was within 25km of the Terhill Centerparcs. I didn’t really know what to expect, but I absolutely loved it and would recommend a visit.  This city of approx 123000 people was beautiful – on the banks of the Meuse river, with a historic cobbled centre including the university campus, lovely parks and river banks and of course amazing bike infrastructure – the Brompton was not too keen on the cobbles of which there were many, but dealt with them ok.

I took this last picture to remind me in the future of how the either-side pedestrian parts of the bridge ascended at the same time as the central part with people continuing their crossing! whilst the large boats/barges sailed on underneath.

 

 

Leiden

From Eindhoven I moved for a night to within 15 mins bike ride of Leiden’s historic city centre, the birthplace of Rembrandt and having the oldest university in the Netherlands. A similar size population-wise to Maastricht, with everything very accessible by bike of course.  I managed to get the last of 5 pitches in a little small-holding within a residential area for the price of 6 euros per night, plus optional 5eu for electricity. Perfect for a stopover. Lots of canals, and the Hortus Botanical Garden was a beautiful place in the centre.

 

What’s not to like.

 

Amsterdam

A short drive from Leiden, and having worked out where to park my high-sided vehicle for the Schipol airport pickup of my sisters, I arrived at my kind of town.

I had a pitch, they a room + bathroom (perhaps not as cheap as might be expected) for a 4-night stay in Camping Zeeburg, a few kms from the centre. Both bikes were now used every day for two visits in and around the centre, using one of the amazing inside free bikeparking provision at the central station, and then a 30-mile total bike ride out to the north and nature areas to a windmill museum. This last bike ride took us right across the main harbour entrance – using the major lock gate cycling/pedestrian ‘bridges’s for the large river cruise and cargo barges. 

The single-speed, pedal-backwards-to-brake hired bike took some getting used to by one of the party (not me), but after the 3 days she had just about got there.  No mishaps. We also did a canal boat tour which was enjoyable. 

The city centre was busy, but perhaps not too bad imo – maybe different in full Summer? We could not have had a better time, loved the central canal-based streets, marvelled again at the infrastructure.

Contrast this with the new tunnel just opened under the Thames in London, – in a city which has really gone for cycling and at least not bad for the UK – with no cycling lanes built as part of it. What lack of competence, joined-up bigger picture, or anti 15-minute town conspiracy theorist, or as usual money saving/car is the only thing in town thinking!!!  This youtube video shows an alternative approach:  https://youtu.be/JCedclz03uI?si=6Wcure8szVyhnVfQ

A comment in a vlog ‘American in Europe’ was ‘America is a business with customers, Europe is a society with people’. I feel that the American model describes the UK and the Netherlands shows part of the alternative.

Posted by admin in Equipment, Netherlands, Places
25
May
2025

The Netherlands, & my travel, infrastructure

Heading on the way back to Rotterdam we met up with my eldest son and his German partner as they came across from Cologne. We stayed for one night in a BnB in the city of Eindhoven, Netherlands, which was a social enterprise within a large campus-type setting providing services and housing for people of all ages who are neuro-divergent or with mental health disabilities.

We spent the next day’s few hours together in a really amazing outdoor ‘Play Park’ for primary and younger children https://www.speelparkdesplinter.nl/english/. As long as the toddler is happy and the weather is pleasant, so are the adults! What a fantastic facility mainly run by volunteers with adults paying 1.50eu to get in. This trip’s travels with a toddler have worked once again.

The Netherlands is so impressive for taking advantage of its natural resources like flat landscapes and investing in the creation of life-friendly green and relaxing environments in its towns and cities, integrating pedestrians, cyclists, canals/waterways, parkland, roads, trams, cars etc. The car seems to be equal rather than king.

Imho, this provision is matched by the new piece of kit I wildly splashed out on this year. Although completely unlike the average dutch bike, my non-electric Brompton fits under the bed in the van alongside my other trusty steed and while I have done some longer bike rides to get used to its combination of hub and derailleur gears, it comes into its own as a quick get-about bike. It will also do for any guests and I am expecting some. I’m trying to get the folding and unfolding more efficient and get the right stuff-carrying equipment eventually. Further cycling kit in the shape of a child bike-seat has also been added to get the next generation used to bikes as soon as possible, but was one item too many to bring along for its potential 2 days of use.

My crammed under-bed garage and other storage spaces also full this trip

Following last year’s van leisure battery problems, I have had a new one fitted, and am relieved to report that the van solar panel is keeping that topped up. This also means the fan installed last year is not causing electrical problems. Additional power can be supplied by the portable ‘Jackery’ battery and inverter, topped up by the van engine on the go or its 2 portable solar panels.  The LPG, topped up in the UK with the usual expected hassles!, is running the fridge. I’m definitely not an advert for filling up an LPG tank, yet it is fantastically good value and lasts for ages, so ultimately worth the ongoing infrequent pain of topping up. My goal of trying to avoid paying electricity charges is more achievable.

I was able to watch the FA cup via BBC Iplayer on my laptop. This was achieved via the tech which is not always successful, as it depends on a wifi or my phone mobile hotspot internet connection plus running a ‘VPN’ (virtual private network) enabling my location to be seen by the BBC etc as a UK one. 

The match was more than a week ago now, but the changed and problematic editing ‘infrastructure’ for this blog has taken me this long to find a solution for. I might well have given up with it all had it not been for the fact of paying for another 3 years of hosting the site at not insignificant cost! It does while away many of the solitary (not unhappy) hours I have, and keeps the grey cells for technology firing, but I need to keep up with recording and curating the content which is accumulating due to my many short-stop visits and do other things when not exploring like reading, rather than trouble-shooting technology. Plus ca change. I will also at some point within the next 3 years have to seriously address how to safeguard all my content for the long-term. That’s a challenge for digital journals, rather than paper.

Posted by admin in Equipment, Musings, Netherlands, Places