The road trip to the sun has officially begun! 🚐☀️
We’re heading south through France toward the Spanish border, and our first four stops have already amazed us. We start our trip with a near-disaster at the petrol pump before waking up in the French sunshine in our absolute favourite stop ideally located on the way to or from Calais. The French sunshine and a few glasses of vineyard wine have only made our trip so far even better!
In this video, we’re sharing our top tips for making travel into Europe easier, including our favorite “secret” stopovers, why we always travel on Sundays, and how we find the most beautiful medieval villages (Les Plus Beaux Villages de France) using our favorite apps.
In this video, we cover:
📍 Our “Practical” stopover in Canterbury (and the free perk you get there!)
⛽ The Diesel vs. Petrol mistake that almost ended our trip.
🇫🇷 Why Sundays are the best days to drive in France.
☀️ Our first stop on the Banks of the River Somme
🏰 Exploring the medieval walled town of Sainte-Suzanne.
🍷 Waking up in a stunning vineyard in the Loire Valley.
🗺️ Our strategy for avoiding Paris traffic and heading toward Perpignan.
Are you planning a trip to Europe? Drop your questions in the comments! Whether it’s about our van setup, the best Aires to stay in, or how much of our 48 liters of oat milk we have left—we’d love to help!
📍 Locations & Apps Mentioned:
Canterbury Park & Ride (Great for the ferry!)
Eacourt Sur Somme (Aire on the banks of the River Somme)
Sainte-Suzanne (Medieval Walled Town)
Saumur Vineyard Stop (Stunning Chateau & Riverside walk)
SearchForSites (Our go-to app)
Les Plus Beaux Villages de France (For finding the “Beautiful Villages”)
🕒 Timestamps:
0:00 The Road Trip Begins!
1:17 Tip 1: The Canterbury Strategy
2:21 The Petrol Disaster… Almost!
2:58 Why we ALWAYS travel on Sundays
4:05 When everything goes wrong (The Reality of Van Life)
6:30 How we plan our route (Avoiding Paris!)
9:38 Finding a private Air in the French countryside
13:34 Exploring the Medieval town of Sainte-Suzanne
15:23 Waking up in a French Vineyard 🍷
17:33 Walking into Saumur & The Chateau
21:20 Managing water, batteries, and grey waste
23:45 Where next? Spain or Germany?
If you enjoyed this video, please give it a LIKE and SUBSCRIBE to follow our journey to the sun! 🚐💨
#VanLife #FranceTravel #CampervanRoadTrip #TravelTips #WhereWeWanda #LoireValley #VineyardLiving #EuropeRoadTrip
13 Comments
Another great video Boss…………….can we have a video of a walk around the van pls – Adam
Also, any reason why you chose a CV vs. MH, or was it just the staff discount ? 🤔
Great video, and some useful tips. Hoping to do something similar in the future so making notes! 📝
Great Vlog both, not been into Europe in our van yet, to many UK destinations still to visit, but we definitely will in the future. Looking forward to the next instalment. Happy and safe travels both.
Great video guys 😃 so inspiring and lovely to see the layers coming off 😎 looking forward to the next one.
But I have to say they are not shoes, they are an embarrassment 🫣😂
Liked and “HYPED” 👍🏼🥳
What a wonderful idea to use the Beau village as a guide 👌 thank you for sharing that x
Great video, lots of information see you next time have fun xx
We are so glad we’ve found you – we collect our first Campervan in 3 weeks! Would love to know how you get internet please? We used to live in the Loire so today’s journey was special to us. Thank you! ❤
Thanks for another great video. Hope you’re having a great trip. I’d be interested if you could share what sites /apps you use to get an overview of European weather forecasts. We’re soon to have the luxury of being able to go on longer trips and will definitely be keen to follow the fine weather and dodge the bad stuff. We’ve found it difficult to find a resource which gives a decent forecast for more than one country at a time.
Hope you find the sunshine soon ☀️
Ah, la belle France! I was lucky to live there for nearly ten years and your video has rejuvenated those memories. Bon voyage and thank you for sharing.
Really enjoyed your video. I especially appreciate you sharing the websites/apps you use to target places to visit and park ups for overnighting.
Love the videos, thank you. We are in our late 50’s and planning for retirement travels starting later this year in our new motorhome. We spend most Sundays drinking red wine and watching videos like yours, writing extensive lists of what to buy, where to stay etc. Lots of your points in our lists so thanks a lot.
Looking forward to following your travels and may bump into you at one of the UK festivals (noticed your Camperjam16 sticker)
Hi guys, love your videos.
Could you tell me, when going to the camper Aires with the barriers do you have to have a card specific for the site or do you just offer up your bank card to the reader?
Many thanks, great video, you reminded us that we visited Saumur in July 2019. We are enjoying your videos and learning a lot 👍