Planes, Trains and Automobiles

Church bells, Dogs and Rain: The search for that elusive of all things, a peaceful night’s sleep.

Sleeping in a campervan, one is a little more ‘in touch’ with your surroundings than staying in a hotel, granted, you aren’t quite as exposed as you would be if camping, but it’s not far off.

Having slept, or tried to sleep, in most of western and central Europe over the last 6 months, here is our campervanners guide for a quiet night.

Don’ts

Don’t park on a flight path (as we did in Budapest)

Don’t park by a railway line (as we did in Budapest)

Don’t park by a police, fire or ambulance station (as we did in Budapest)

You guessed it, Budapest was noisy!

Under NO circumstances park amongst automatic grass sprinklers which come out to play at 1am!

Try to avoid staying near a busy main road (as we did in Karlovy Vary)

Church Bells

We feel we are now the authority on the subject of church bells, having experienced the 10pm and 11pm watershed, the 6am, 7am and 8am restart, the variety of 24 hour chiming every 15 minutes with an extra flourish on the hour, or even half hour. There is obviously an international rule that states: When one or more churches should be in ‘striking’ distance of each other, never shall they be synchronised. If you are particularly unlucky, you can get a hat-trick of churches striking randomly enough to ensure that the only chance you are going to experience a silent night is to come at Christmas time.

Dogs

We love dogs, but not from 10pm until dawn when they take turns at out barking each other from various points around the village or town. Spain and Portugal are the biggest offenders, where dogs are free to roam either singularly, or in packs, and leave their plain brown packets wherever they choose.

Rain

A difficult one this, heavy rain and thunderstorms are always a sure fire way to take your mind off counting sheep. You could reduce the chance of this by steering clear of anywhere where it’s warm during June, particularly mountainous areas, and non mountainous areas.

Summary

Keep well away from airports, cities and main roads.

Don’t park within 2 miles of any church.

Avoid villages, particularly in Spain and Portugal as they will probably have a dog problem, you may even get it in Italy, France, Slovenia, Croatia, Slovakia, Bosnia, Serbia, Hungary, Romania, Poland and the Czech Republic, but not Germany, you can’t hear them for the church bells!

Don’t go out in the rain.

Avoid Europe in June.

Give grass sprinklers a miss.

That should just about cover it, goodnight.

P.S. Please don't contact us to buy Harry, we may need him to come to Europe again........in June