Back from holiday!

Posted by bert hubert Sat, 29 Jul 2006 12:09:00 GMT

Just got back from holiday, sadly on the same day as family member was admitted to the hospital, but that should not taint our massively succesful vacation!

For the first time, Mirjam and I were able to take our own car and drive it around Europe. Years ago our parents showed us (independently, we didn’t know each other then) the pretty places to visit in countries near and far, it is really a great feeling to be able to go out ourselves now!

Here’s a picture of our Skoda to a spectacular backdrop, and a mysterious container for ‘civil protection’:

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Due to the heatwave in Europe, we’ve only stayed on campings above 500m, ending up at 1500m, which meant the temperatures were nice. We started at the Heidenkopf campsite in the The Elzas, which was very fine except that the sanitation is in need of modernization.

After two days there we moved to a campsite on the border between France and Switzerland. At this time, I have to explain we went on vacation with only one passport, Mirjam having lost hers a few days before we left. Most EU countries, and some non-EU ones, are members of the Schengen agreement, which means that as a rule, passports are not checked on borders. And indeed, you can pass the Dutch/Belgian border at highway speeds. There is a sign, but that’s about it.

However, given the current “security” climate, we had some fear we’d get into problems. We need not have been afraid, our 15 days of vacation passed without anybody asking for a second piece of identification. All hail the EU, in this respect.

There was some residual fear though, most European countries demand that people be able to identify themselves though. But this didn’t happen.

Ok, so we went the the ‘Haute Jura’, which stretches out over France and Switzerland. And we have a satellite navigation system.. that knows nothing about countries. It does know a good road when it sees one though, and the ones in Switzerland in that area are superiour to those in France. So given any chance, the navigation computer sends you to Switzerland, even when your final destination is in France. Switzerland, while a member of the Schengen agreement, does have serious border control. Furthermore, Swiss highways are very expensive to drive on, requiring a certificate.

I think we’ve seen half a dozen Swiss border posts while in the Haute Jura, they crop up everywhere! In the end we discovered the routes that stayed in France though.

After a few days there, on a rather Disneyfied campsite that had recently (it appears) been acquired by a large company with the interesting name of Homair, we left for our final destination, Courmayeur in Italy, as suggested by my father.

Courmayeur sits on the Italian side of the Mont-Blanc tunnel, and is at a height of around 1500 metres, as is the excellent La Sorgente campsite. The pictures linked to this post are from there.

We spent 6 days excellent there, and then drove back, staying the night in a very fine St. Martin (Logis the France) hotel, in a village of 280 people. It did serve a four course dinner with excellent wine and cheese though.

On driving back, Mirjam and I remarked that it got awfully hot in the car. When we stopped for one of our frequent breaks, we saw a newspaper with ‘39C in the shade’ filling most of the front page (around 102F) - we thought it was just us having a hot car.

Camping

People either love or hate it. I think a fair amount of emotion is involved - when you mention you had a great time camping, you often encounter people gushing to share horror stories with you how everything went wrong when they tried it. The passion with which these feelings are shared is stunning, it must hit something deep.

I’ve long learned not to try to convince these people, but it hurts me to know what they are missing!

First, a picture to show what I mean:

Our tent is the small one hiding under the tree. Imagine waking up to that sight. Pick up bread and croissants from the little shop, make some coffee, bake an egg, and just let the scenery work on you.

There is a sort of magic on these campsites. There are lots of people, and it is nice to see them enjoying their vacation. You could talk to them, if you wanted, but you could also stick to friendly greetings, it is fine either way.

I think these other people serve as a sort of backdrop for my relaxation. For some reason, I am relaxed the minute I sit before a tent. It would be good to figure out why this is, it might help me relax during the rest of the year.

But back to the magic - it is like living in the 1950s I think. If you pick the right campsites, and this is vital, you’ll encounter a politeness rarely seen in large countries anymore. People move around carefully not to violate each other’s space, children play making joyful noises, but there is no loud music, no racket.

When people go out, they leave their tent nice and neat. Nothing obsessive about this, but in places like these it is extraordinary to not clean up before going away.

If it suddenly starts to rain, you can rest assured neighbours who remained on the campsite will notice if you’ve not closed your tent properly, and close it up for you. If a storm picks up, people will more often than not take down any parts of your tent or caravan unable to deal with the weather.

But at the same time, there is lots of privacy.

What to do

In most surveys, people tend to state that they are very active on vacation. Hiking, visiting museums, mountain climbing, diving, swimming etc are all named. Recently, there was another survey here in The Netherlands which was probably more cleverly worded, I’m not sure how they did it, but the result was that what most people enjoy doing most on holiday is… nothing (and reading).

I’ve long thought this. Hiking is fun, walking is fun, swimming is fun, the occasional museum is fun, but in the end most people, including me, just need to relax. Vacation is not work. Note that there are people who are so full of energy they can’t sit still, I hope they can relax by being active.

However, all this leaves the question, what to do for the time you are not doing any of these active things. The good news is that camping offers lots of opportunities to constructively waste time. For a start, you can spend a lot of time on cooking or otherwise preparing food. Because there is less equipment to work with, this can take as much time as you want.

In order to cook, you need to discover the local shops and/or supermarkets, which can be very exciting if you are abroad. There is bound to be stuff for sale you’ve never heard of, but which might be delicious. In Europe, for me this goes especially for France, Portugal, Spain and Italy.

Then there is the business of keeping your tent and other equipment in shape.

Before you know it, you’ve whiled away another day in serious relaxation.

Also, if you want to go do stuff, it is easy to do. In fact, due to the incredible freedom of camping, you can hop around. Want to climb several mountain ranges? By all means.

We mostly go camping with the goal to walk a lot, in practice this depends highly on what we feel like. It doesn’t really matter, you’ll rarely go bored camping.

Some tips

Ok, I can’t resist, I need to evangelise camping a bit more. I’ve heard all the horror stories from people who tried, and yes, you can mess up in a big way. Contrary to what people think, camping is not generally cheap. It can be if you know what you are doing, though.

Examples of messing up include going out with ‘stay over’ sleeping bags, which have been washed 25 times at home and are therefore severly degraded. Or borrowing a 25 year old tent from someone. Or bringing a matrass that leaks or is too thin. Or trying to erect a tent after driving a 1000km. Or picking a campsite at random and ending up with football hooligans looking for a cheap place to sleep. There are some really horrible camp sites out there.

So, here is my advice if you want to try camping:

1. Find a friend who is experienced, and use him or her as a guide.
2. Take extraordinary care in selecting at least the initial campsite. Preferrably ask your friend for a favorite. Invest in a good camping guide. In Europe the German ADAC ones are great. This will allow you to select a campsite that suits your needs. If you want a quiet place, select sites without disco, animation, etc. Do pick top-notch sanitation.
3. You need excellent equipment. For example, modern tents are cheap, lightweight, breathe in fresh air, are extremely water tight, easy to set up, but something has to give. The dark secret is that most modern tents only last 5 or 6 long seasons. So if you decide to borrow a tent, make sure it is still in great condition. Same goes for sleeping bags, matrasses etc. This is one of the easiest ways to mess up.
4. Be sure to arrive at your chosen campsite at a reasonable hour, preferrably without having exhausted yourself behind the wheel. This serves two purposes, you’ll have an easier time erecting your tent but you’ll also have a chance to find another campsite nearby if the first one disappoints, or is full.
5. By all means bring a table and chairs. Also consider investing in a decent coolbox or even a refrigerator. Doing without these things seriously makes life harder. There are die-hard campers that do without all these luxuries, and I wish them good luck, but it is not for me. I like my eggs unhatched and my beer cold, and preferrably on a table!

If you have any questions, feel free to email me on bert.hubert@netherlabs.nl.

I’ll miss camping until next year…