Our Journey Route

Route Map

This map we’ve put together shows all of the places we have stayed so far, complete with GPS co-ordinates and information such as parking prices and water availability. Each point has a link to the blog post in which we’ve discussed the spot, so you can read a bit more information about each place. We’ll try to keep it as updated as often as possible, depending on time and WiFi availability. If you’re a friend/relative we hope you find it interesting, and if you’re a motorhomer we hope it’s of use to you!

Click here to open the above fully in Google Maps.

Journey Summary

After finishing work in autumn 2014, we finally left the UK in December 2014. We left the country with the knowledge that we would have to return to the UK fairly soon, as Matt was waiting on the list of final amendments he would have to make to his PhD thesis before he could officially graduate. With that in mind, we decided we would work our way down south-western France and from there make a beeline down to Portugal for the winter, being out of the country for 31 days total, as that was the longest we could take on our pre-existing travel insurance policies (and didn’t want to buy our new travel insurance until we left longer term). We found ourselves quite taken with the Algarve thanks to the great free-overnighting opportunities, and ended up spending three weeks down there before we had to head back for our ferry.

From here we had to spend three months in the UK whilst Matt completed the final work on his PhD as well as taking care of other jobs back home before we could set off on our way again. Having the month away was a good warm-up run for our trip, as it gave us time to get used to our van (prior to this point the longest we’d been away in this particular van was 5 days), as well as figure out what things we could leave behind to spare some weight, or what things we hadn’t packed that we knew we’d miss.

After Matt finished his work, we got a fresh MOT on the van (as this would otherwise have been due a few months later in August) as well as a long term travel insurance policy, and set off again on our way in April 2015. We wanted to cover Greece before the peak of summer hit, so we cut across Germany and Austria into Italy, taking a month exploring the main cities and sights such as Venice and Rome on the way to southern Italy. We caught a ferry from Brindisi to Patras in the Peloponnese. The potential for places to stay in Greece proved to be fantastic and we loved it there, so ended up staying all the way through the hot temperatures of July because we were in no rush to leave the country.

We made our way back north via passage of Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary. Our insurance policy (as with most UK insurers) doesn’t cover us for many non-EU countries, so for now we will be leaving the countries to the west of the Balkans (Bosnia, Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Albania, Macedonia) for potential future trips. From Hungary we travelled south through Croatia and back up into Slovenia. Our route from there was dependant on the time it took us to get this far as we wanted to be heading south before the winter weather arrives.

We had originally hoped to cover Austria and Switzerland next but due to slowing down and taking our time to enjoy the places more since Greece it was time to start heading south. We cut across northern Italy and southern France, taking longer than anticipated due to surprisingly nice sunny and warm weather with temperatures into the 20’s (°C) through October and into November. From here we have started to tour around Spain and Portugal for the winter, with a trip back to the UK in December for Matt’s graduation. We’ll potentially be spending some time in Morocco depending on how things go and the situation in the country at the time.

We have to be back in the UK in April 2016 for our MOT, so this is our intended cut-off point for finishing our journey and getting into full-time work. However if we manage to stay under budget and have enough money left over to do so, we may come back out for a while and spend some time exploring northern Europe. It’s been a great few months travelling so far, and we’re excited about the period that lies ahead.

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Blog Posts

If you’re interested about reading about our experiences in any one specific place, we’ve put together the following table with links to all of our posts in chronological order to help you find what you’re looking for. Alternatively, all of the pinpoints on the map above feature links to the relevant blog posts.

	Location	Blog Post	Time Span
001	England, NE – France, SW	Journey Beginnings	20^th – 24^th Dec 2014
002	France, SW	Christmas at Mimizan	25^th – 27^th Dec 2014
003	Spain Central, Portugal S	Entering Portugal: The Sunny Algarve	27^th – 30^th Dec 2014
004	Portugal, SW	Exploring the Southwest Coast of Portugal	31^st Dec 2014 – 2^nd Jan 2015
005	Portugal, S	Raposeira Beaches and into Albufeira	3^rd – 6^th Jan 2015
006	Portugal, S/SW	Salema, Sagres and an adventure in Laundry	7^th – 11^th Jan 2015
007	Portugal, S	Hunting WiFi and an Alvor Mini-Break	12^th – 14^th Jan 2015
008	Portugal, Spain, France	The Journey Back: Algarve to East Midlands	15^th – 20^th Jan 2015
009	England	Time at Home	Jan – Apr 2015
009a	England, Lake District	A Detour to the Lakes	12^th – 14^th Apr 2015
010	France, Belgium, Germany	Nürburgring and Eura Mobil: Travelling South through Germany	25^th- 27^th Apr 2015
011	Germany, Austria, Italy	The Reschen Pass and the stupidity of a Traveller: Navigating Austria	28^th – 30^th Apr 2015
012	Italy, Venice	Amongst the Canals and Backstreets: Exploring Venice	1^st – 4^th May 2015
013	Italy, N	In Fair Verona: Shakespearean Cities and The Lakes	5^th – 8^th May 2015
014	Italy, Central	Bologna and Lago le Tamerici	9^th – 12^th May 2015
015	Italy, Central	Traversing Tuscany: Pisa and Florence	13^th – 15^th May 2015
016	Italy & Rep. of San Marino	San Marino and Travelling South towards Rome	16^th – 19^th May 2015
017	Italy, Rome	When in Rome	20^th – 23^rd May 2015
018	Italy, S	Pompeii, the Amalfi Coast and Southern Italy	24^th – 26^th May 2015
019	Greece SW (Peloponnese)	A Grim time with Grimaldi Lines: The Ferry to Greece	26^th – 28^th May 2015
020	Greece SW (Peloponnese)	Killinis Beach and Olympia	29^th May – 1^st Jun 2015
021	Greece SW (Peloponnese)	Tholo Beach and Methoni	2^nd – 5^th Jun 2015
022	Greece S (Peloponnese)	The end of the Messinian Peninsula: Koroni and Petalidi	6^th – 10^th Jun 2015
023	Greece S (Peloponnese)	Mystra and the Outer Mani	11^th – 15^th Jun 2015
024	Greece S (Peloponnese)	The Inner Mani – Porto Kagio and Kamares	16^th – 18^th Jun 2015
025	Greece S (Peloponnese)	The Dimitrios Shipwreck and our first venture into Urban Exploration	19^th – 23^rd Jun 2015
026	Greece S (Peloponnese)	Monemvasia	24^th – 26^th Jun 2015
027	Greece S (Peloponnese)	Touring the Argolid: More Beaches and a little more Urban Exploration	27^th Jun – 2^nd Jul 2015
028	Greece S (Peloponnese)	The End of the Peloponnese: Exploring Epidavros and Corinth	3^rd – 7^th Jul 2015
029	Greece Central	Central Greece South Coast: Delphi and Nafpaktos	8^th – 12^th Jul 2015
030	Greece, Lefkada	A Weeks’ Windsurfing Holiday in Vassiliki	13^th – 20^th Jul 2015
031	Greece, N	The Monasteries of Meteora	21^st – 25^th Jul 2015
032	Greece, NE	Halkidiki – Our Last Week in Greece	25^th Jul – 2^nd Aug 2015
033	Greece, Bulgaria	Monasteries and Mountains: Our Induction into Bulgaria	3^rd – 5^th Aug 2015
034	Bulgaria	Walking, Sightseeing and Camping in Bulgaria	6^th – 10^th Aug 2015
035	Bulgaria, Romania	The Black Sea to Bucharest: Roaming Romania	11^th – 13^th Aug 2015
036	Romania	Bucharest and Several Transylvanian Castles	14^th – 17^th Aug 2015
037	Romania	Vidraru Dam and Transfagarasan Pass	18^th – 20^th Aug 2015
038	Romania	Sighisoara and Northern Romania	21^st – 23^rd Aug 2015
039	Romania, Hungary	First Days in Hungary	24^th – 26^th Aug 2015
040	Hungary	Miles from Budapest	27^th – 30^th Aug 2015
041	Hungary, Croatia	Goodbye Hungary, Hello Croatia	31^st Aug – 6^th Sep 2015
042	Croatia	Krka National Park and Southern Croatia	6^th – 10^th Sep 2015
043	Croatia	Plitvice National Park and Heading North	11^th – 14^th Sep 2015
044	Croatia	Into Istria: Pula, Rovinj and the Kamenjak Peninsula	15^th – 18^th Sep 2015
045	Slovenia, Italy	The Skocjan Caves and the Slovenian Coast	19^th – 21^st Sep 2015
046	Slovenia	Ljubljana and Northern Slovenia	21^st – 24^th Sep 2015
047	Slovenia	Lake Bled and the Vintgar Gorge	25^th – 28^th Sep 2015
048	Slovenia	Lake Bohinj and Mount Vogel	29^th Sep – 2^nd Oct 2015
049	Italy	From Venzone to Vicenza	2^nd – 5^th Oct 2015
050	Italy	Italian Lakes: Como, Maggiore and More	6^th – 10^th Oct 2015
051	Italy	Turin and the Piedmont Region	11^th – 15^th Oct 2015
052	Italy, France	Piedmont to the Côte d'Azur	16^th – 19^th Oct 2015
053	South France	More Time along the Côte d'Azur: St. Paul-de-Vence to St. Tropez	20^th – 23^rd Oct 2015
054	South France	A Weekend Walking in the Verdon Gorge	24^th – 25^th Oct 2015
055	South France	The Verdon Gorge: Too Good to Leave	26^th – 30^th Oct 2015
056	South France	Aix-en-Provence, The Calanques and around	30^th Oct – 3^rd Nov 2015
057	South France	The Camargue	4^th – 7^th Nov 2015
058	South France	Last days in France	7^th – 11^th Nov 2015
059	Andorra, Spain	Meeting Fellow Travellers in Northern Spain	12^th – 14^th Nov 2015
060	Spain	Pamplona and San Sebastian	15^th – 18^th Nov 2015
061	Spain	Elephant Hunting in Cabárceno	19^th – 22^nd Nov 2015
062	Spain	The Rain in Spain Falls Mainly on Us	22^nd – 26^th Nov 2015
063	Spain	In and Around A Coruña	27^th – 30^th Nov 2015
064	Spain, France	Back to the UK	1^st – 5^th Dec 2015
065	UK	Back in Blighty	6^th – 21^st Dec 2015
066	France	Another Christmas in South-West France, Why Not?	22^nd – 29^th Dec 2015
067	France, Spain, Portugal	Into Portugal, Joined by the Rain	29^th Dec 2015– 4^th Jan 2016
068	Portugal	Waiting Out the Weather in Estremadura, Portugal	4^th – 10^th Jan 2016
069	Portugal	The Sun Reappears in Sintra and Cascais	11^th – 14^th Jan 2016
070	Portugal	A Britfest, A Barragem and a Chapel of Bones: Sesimbra to Evora	15^th – 19^th Jan 2016
071	Portugal	Sitting on Top of the World at Monsaraz	19^th – 23^rd Jan 2016
072	Portugal	Santiago do Cacém and the Alentejo Coast	24^th – 31^st Jan 2016
073	Portugal	Retreading Old Steps along the South West Coast	1^st – 5^th Feb 2016
074	Portugal	Into the Heart of the Algarve	6^th – 11^th Feb 2016
075	Portugal	Portimao, Lagos and Silves	11^th – 14^th Feb 2016
076	Portugal	Ferragudo, Monchique and Alvor	15^th – 20^th Feb 2016
077	Portugal	Eastern Algarve: Faro, Loulé and Estói	20^th – 23^rd Feb 2016
078	Portugal	The Final Stretch of the Algarve and Mina de São Domingos	24^th – 28^th Feb 2016
079	Portugal, Spain	Adios Piri-Piri, Hola Tapas! Seville and El Rócio	29^th Feb – 4^th Mar 2016
080	Spain	Looking out at Africa from Tarifa, Andalucia	4^th – 13^th Mar 2016
081	Spain	From British Fish 'n' Chips to Moorish White Towns: Gibraltar to Ronda	14^th – 18^th Mar 2016
082	Spain	Exploring Inland Andalucía: El Torcal, Antequera and Sierra Nevada	18^th – 23^rd Mar 2016
083	Spain	Back to the Coast: Cabo de Gata and the Costa Calida	24^th – 28^th Mar 2016
084	Spain	The Golfo de Mazarrón	29^th Mar – 1^st Apr 2016
085	Spain	Puerto de Mazarrón, Cartagena and onto the Costa Blanca	2^nd – 5^th Apr 2016
086	Spain	Alicante to Javea via Benidorm!	6^th – 10^th Apr 2016
087	Spain	Paella of the Past and Buildings of the Future: Valencia	11^th – 14^th Apr 2016
088	Spain	Morella and the Delta de l'Ebre	15^th – 19^th Apr 2016
089	Spain	Barcelona and Dia de Sant Jordi	20^th – 23^rd Apr 2016
090	Spain, France	Costa Brava	24^th – 27^th Apr 2016
091	France	Blown Away by the Winds (and Sights) in the Luberon, Provence	28^th Apr – 1^st May 2016
092	France	Roman remains and a 3800% increase in the wine budget, Arles to l'Ardèche	2^nd – 5^th May 2016
093	France	From One Brilliant View to Another, Into the Northern French Alps Ski Resorts	6^th – 10^th May 2016
094	France and Switzerland	Snow Capped Mountains in Switzerland	11^th – 15^th May 2016
095	Switzerland	Samping the Fantastic Scenery and Walking in the Pennine Alps	16^th – 19^th May 2016
096	Switzerland	Torrent Neuf and Interlaken	20^th – 23^rd May 2016
097	Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Italy	Switzerland and an Unplanned Italian Detour	24^th – 29^th May 2016
098	Switzerland and Germany	Isny and Lindau, Germany	30^th May – 3^rd Jun 2016
099	Austria	Into Austria, in and around Innsbruck	3^rd – 6^th Jun 2016
100	Austria	Ambling across Austria: Zell am See to Graz	7^th – 12^th Jun 2016
101	Austria	Down the Danube: Melk and the Wachau Valley	13^th – 16^th Jun 2016
102	Austria	Coffee, Cake and Currywurst, Thanks Vienna	17^th – 19^th Jun 2016
103	Czech Republic	Beer and Bones: Exploring the Czech Republic	20^th – 24^th Jun 2016
104	Czech Republic	Prague	24^th – 26^th Jun 2016
105	Czech Republic and Germany	Pilsen to Karlovy Vary, and onwards into Germany	27^th – 30^th Jun 2016
106	Germany	Moseying along the Mosel	1^st – 5^th Jul 2016

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