Eastern Europe

alcam

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I know big area . Basically I'm heading for Poland , Czechia , Slovakia , Slovenia and back into Italy . All very flexible route wise and destination wise .
Any information on travelling in these countries would be gratefully received . I've made a list below of the main points I'm unsure of but would welcome any advice at all .

Routes and toll roads [need to use , permits ?]

Must see places , country and town .

Wildcamping country and town

Dog friendly , cafes , bars etc

Dumping , gas , water

Relevant books

Thanks in anticipation
 
Only one I have done is Slovenia. Lovely people and a lovely country. We were mainly in the Triglav national park and around Lake Bled and Lake Bohinj. Everyone flocks to Lake Bled but I preferred Lake Bohinj. Ljubljana the capital is worth a look. Lovely city centre.

Around Bled there is only one Campsite and wilding I think is out of the question. I think wild camping is prohibited in the park but I suspect you might get away with the odd hidden away spot. There are one or two aires but sites were not that expensive even in July.

I wrote an account of our visit there and a few photos here. Slovenia - Adventures In Hank The Tank
 
The camperstop europe book has marked aires for slovenia, croatia and italy. And probably the countries you will go through to get there. Well worth the money. There are also aire apps you can download but I haven't done it.
 
I have been to

Czech Republic and Hungary (different trips)
On 2 different trips.
Not much (any) wild camping but sites are cheap and both countries very nice.

With your other countries Romania is not on ...but that is a good thing no real problem but too big and "Loony Drivers"
Little wild camping (others will disagree on Romania)
 
We have travelled to some of the listed countries, so this is my brief comments:

Poland, we stayed on sites, all pretty cheap and decent facilities, bar someone's garden we stopped at in Wroclaw miserable bloke, he gets an average 3/10 on another site and charged for everything. We went for Auschwitz (stayed in the car park here - waste emptying and electric (I think there was grey dumping as well but it was a few years back), then onto Krakow, we stayed on a site in the city good facilities and cheap bus trip into the city for the Jewish Ghetto, Schindler's Factory and the old town, the salt mine is supposed to be amazing but we passed on that. Dogs are fine around the town and Ghetto but not allowed in any to any of the others. Everyone was friendly bar the Wroclaw man.

Czech Republic, we stopped at a site in the middle of nowhere, that was cheap and full of Dutch people, there were hundreds of them all staying in little wooden cabins. It was so dark you could see every star in the sky, then onto Prague, we stopped in a dedicated motorhome site near the zoo and gardens, we met my mum and dad here, they enjoyed the gardens but we never went. The site was full but cheap. It was close to the tram and easy to get to the old city, we just wandered and argued with the RAC on the phone, as the exhaust broke and the garage wanted a fortune for a new exhaust, we ended up at a Fiat car main dealer who welded the exhaust for about 20 Euros, it is still doing well to this day. You need a vignete for the Czech Republic we stopped at the first garage in and after the girl practised her English on me I had the sticker for the windscreen.

Italy we have been to Venice amazingly expensive, there is motorhome parking just over the causeway it was pricey, but well worth a visit. We also stayed in Treviso a free site, a bit of a dump but everything there. We walked into the town and were amazed, a fantastic place to explore. Then onto Verona, saw a motorhome with a smashed side window and the dash cam filmed someone messing with our van, this was in a main car park, we walked into the town and around the arena (no dogs) but a lovely town, a mass of people near some balcony and I did not even spot anyone called Juliet! There is a dedicated motorhome area a little further out so that might be a better idea. Roads were expensive in Italy it is all tolls on the motorways.

I forgot to say, roads in the Czech Republic and more so in Poland were very rough, in Poland on the motorway you have the bumpy road signs and it says 10km's but you soon realise the 10k is to the next sign and not the flat bits. They were spending lots on the roads so they are good in places.
 
Don't go too far to the East and get mixed in with tanks lined up along the Belarus border.
 
We also traveled to Poland in 2016. Great place - check out places we stayed at www.eurosum16.blogspot.com
 
Poland is a superb place to visit. My other half is Polish so I am fortunate to have a guide and translator so happy days. We've spent a few years going back and fro to her house which is nearer to Belarus side of Poland. Over the time that we've been there we have covered most of Poland..top to bottom, left to right...it really is easy going and wild camping is never a problem.
We've also drifted over to Lithuania as we have friends there too. Again very friendly although I preferred Poland. The people are great and nothing is a problem. The attitude is can do rather than computer say no!!....lovely.

We've wilded all the time, not once on site...very few about. Cheap cost of living and decent quality food. We nearly bought a place out there but circumstances changed.
Can't seem to upload pics...take it from me, some wonderful scenery out there.
 

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Hi, Check out "Aires on a shoestring" with the exception of Poland we have covered all of these Countries.

Dezi :camper::cheers:
 
Some of our favourite parts of Europe. So much to see, people are genuinely friendly and welcoming.
We wild camped all through Eastern Europe with no problems. We have 3 young children and never felt unsafe or unwelcome.
Don't know about places accepting dogs, but there are plenty of strays around, so you may want to watch out for that.
Gas - we had a gaslow re-fillable system and could refill at any petrol station. In Italy you can't refill gas at petrol stations, so make sure you enter with full tanks. We were able to fill up in San Marino though.
Food, cafes, restaurants etc. are excellent and good value - Italy more expensive than Poland, Slovakia etc.
In Slovakia we spent a bit of time in the Tatry Mountains which was beautiful.
We used Camper Contact website and Dezi's Aires on a shoestring (thanks Dezi!) to find places, but also just found our own places, especially along the Danube - you can see our route on our blog: Gone Walkabout | The Laing family's 18 month adventure around Europe!

Have an awesome trip!
 
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LPG in Italy

5dotsonamap said:
Gas - we had a gaslow re-fillable system and could refill at any petrol station. In Italy you can't refill gas at petrol stations, so make sure you enter with full tanks. We were able to fill up in San Marino though.
Click to expand...
We spent 6 months in Italy with fitted refillable tanks Oct 2015 to March 2016 and had no problem refilling our LPG tanks. Used myLPG.eu.eu app to find places - 90% up to date. Only once did an attendant say it was not allowed, but we told him we'd been sei messe en italie - no problemo... bad Italian, but he understood and was then fine.
Enjoy your trip.
 
Budapest was on travelman last night and looked good and cheap. On my to-do list :)
 
I travelled all these countries last year. Italy looked more third world than any of the others and far more expensive.

The Tatra mountains in Slovakia are amazing, definitely spend some time around there. On the whole, campsites (I had a car and tent) were £4-£5 a night so didn't wild camp much at all.

There's an app on the play store specifically for Czech campsites that's free, I think it might be a tourist board thing; but I just used Archies, which is what I use everywhere and pretty much always gives somewhere open/good.

Check these places out in Slovakia:

Camping Slne?né skaly - Rajecké Teplice | DoKempu.cz

ATC Bystrina - Demänovská Dolina | DoKempu.cz

They were great campsites. The second one even had a kitchen area you could use to cook, although I didn't realise this until I was leaving. They both have great walks from the campsite providing you're happy heading up :)

Budapest is great, Hungary is mostly flat with a large lake in the middle that seems to be the place to go, lots of campsites
Czech Republic, cheap, I didn't find sites particularly easy to find here. The best area was the North West, lots of mountain biking going on around the Polish/Czech border, lots of places to stay
Slovakia, go to those two campsites listed, they're good.
Slovenia, lots of mountains, cheap version of Austria/Italy. Lubjiuana well worth visiting and the West coast is like Italy.
Italy - Lakes full of tourists, expensive, rubbish. Genoa was pretty cool but it's a city built on a cliff so don't go there with a motorhome. Scenic routes can be a little bit jarring timewise.
Poland - Pretty good although I had trouble finding campsites. North coast near a place called Lazy is like Benidorm, avoid. Stayed with a friend near the Czech border in the South West and it's lovely around there for mountains and walks, lakes etc.

I had no problems taking a dog with me.
 
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Gas in Italy

5dotsonamap said:
Some of our favourite parts of Europe. So much to see, people are genuinely friendly and welcoming.
We wild camped all through Eastern Europe with no problems. We have 3 young children and never felt unsafe or unwelcome.
Don't know about places accepting dogs, but there are plenty of strays around, so you may want to watch out for that.
Gas - we had a gaslow re-fillable system and could refill at any petrol station. In Italy you can't refill gas at petrol stations, so make sure you enter with full tanks. We were able to fill up in San Marino though.
Food, cafes, restaurants etc. are excellent and good value - Italy more expensive than Poland, Slovakia etc.
In Slovakia we spent a bit of time in the Tatry Mountains which was beautiful.
We used Camper Contact website and Dezi's Aires on a shoestring (thanks Dezi!) to find places, but also just found our own places, especially along the Danube - you can see our route on our blog: Gone Walkabout | The Laing family's 18 month adventure around Europe!

Have an awesome trip!
Click to expand...

"In Italy you can't refill gas at petrol stations"...not entirely true. There is just one garage chain that is awkward, we only had trouble at one...they happily redirected us to another a few kilometres away who served us with no trouble.
 
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