Euro Trip, 2018

2018 European Campervan Route.

Happy to be home after a 6-week 25-city whirlwind tour of Europe!  A list of all cities visited is presented as Table 1 at the bottom of this post.

After leaving England a month ago, Natasha, Sebastian, and I conquered Aarhus on bike, then I reunited with Viola, Miri, and Daan to campervan from the Netherlands to Northern Spain.  

Subsequently, I went to a surfing camp in Esmoriz near Porto, Portugal and ended the trip exploring the city and beaches near Lisbon.

The Denmark to Spain Campervan Crew!

Some lessons learned along the way on this trip: 

1. Germans like to skinny dip when drinking and can run surprisingly fast when you try to steal their clothes, 
2. the Danish are a wonderful enlightened people that are terrified of direct sunlight without sunscreen, 
3. the French are very good at building castles and bakeries, how they make some of the best pastries in the world while staying petite is something the scientific community should spend more time researching, 
4. perhaps to compensate for how freezing their waters are, the Portuguese are a warm and welcoming people, and 
5.  the north coast of Spain is gorgeous and bespeckled with charming little coastal towns that are surprisingly campervan friendly (as long as you ignore all the signs that say no campervan parking).

Looking forward to seeing my Cali friends again, IM me so we can meet up for coffee and/or shenanigans! 

I’m not very good at metric, so I’ll estimate that this was a triple-overhead wave when I dropped in :)

Sebastian busting some pretty fly dance moves at the Aarhus museum.

Each morning Miri and Viola would feed the camper driver with pastries
… good thing I wore stretchy pants :)

My newfound friends at the Surfivor surf camp.  Who knew that Esmoriz, Portugal was one of the best places to try and learn German?  Fun fact … Khaled “The Legend” Tayeb is the only one sporting breakfast red wine rather than a surfboard

Tasha striking a pose on the Infinity Bridge along our cycling tour of Aarhus.

The tiny town of Getaria, Spain.  Our camper is parked top left.  It cost an exorbitant 3 euros a day to park here … luckily we were able to split the cost between the 4 of us :)

Viola schnell’s off for her birthday surf in Zarautz, Spain.
Our trusty campervan ‘Hedwig’ is in the backdrop.  It looked and performed like a Winnebago built in a communist bloc country in the 1960’s.  When we hit the breaks, the cabinets would frequently open and disgorge their contents on a lucky passenger :)

The ridiculously photogenic comedy team of Sebastian and Natasha
with the Aarhus infinity bridge in the backdrop.

Getting some culture at the Bilboa Guggenheim.  Well, maybe not that much culture, we never went inside, we just posed with the puppy made of flowers :)

The first night of our camper trip we parked in the dark in a little town after getting lost.  Turns out we parked in front of a hotel/palace that was nearly empty.  The staff set up a table and served us coffee while we had a private view of the palace gardens.  When we asked for the bathroom, we found one that the doors opened up so you could watch swans swim in a little pond while relieving oneself.  The entire experience cost us 2 euros each … Starbucks really has to up their game if they want to compete with this place :)

Jorn’s sister Barbara and her husband Mads were kind enough to take me on a cycling tour of their town of Copenhagen!

Miri’s ankle was still recovering from her skydiving accident, so she could not go sunset surfing with Viola and I.  Instead, she made us a delicious vegan curry dinner and met us outside the camper wearing nothing but an apron we returned.  One of life’s magic little moments!

A quick post surf glass of wine turned into an all day tasting where we decided we should put our ‘happy to pay price’ for each bottle of wine we tasted on our forehead.  I don’t remember the rules, but I’m sure that Sofia laughed the most and Khaled lapped us at some point :)

Breakfast at a Carvoeira B&B near one of Viola’s favorite yoga/surf camp.  Quite a step up from the 4-person dogpile in our former camper.

Lisbon throws computer scientists some love with this parking lot art installation.

Post surf beer and cross dressing for the last of the week one surf group.

Abendbrot with Viola’s charming parents in their backyard garden in Kiel.

Surfer field trip to Porto.  We started by train in the afternoon, we returned via uber at 4:30am, not everyone made the next mornings surf :)

Table 1.  Here are the cities visited, since we were trying to find remote places in the camper, many of them are a little off the normal beaten path.  Let me know if you plan to visit any and I’m happy to share travel advice.

Special thanks to Miri and Viola for doing all the campervan route planning!

1. London, England

2. Oxfordshire, England

3. Brighton, England

4. Cambridge, England

5. Copenhagen, Denmark

6. Aarhus, Denmark

7. Odense, Denmark

8. Kiel, Germany

9. Sprundel, Netherlands

10. Ermenonville, France

11. Nonaville, France

12. Bordeaux, France

13. Moliets-et-Maa, France

14. Biarritz, , France

15. San Sebastián, Spain

16. Zarautz, Spain

17. Getaria, Spain

18. Bilbao, Spain

19. Sopelana, Spain

20. Santoña, Spain

21. Esmoriz, Portugal

22. Espinho, Portugal

23. Porto, Portugal

24. Lisbon, Portugal

25. Carvoeira, Portugal