In this instructional YouTube video, Kathryn "Kat" Bird of Wandering Bird shares ten common mistakes that motorhome travelers often make when touring Europe, and offers practical solutions. She begins by stressing the importance of confirming European insurance coverage and knowing your policy number. She then warns against under‑estimating driving distances, recommending a daily limit of 2‑3 hours and using the Aire system for flexible campsite planning. Kat points out that not every European country uses the euro, listing the notable non‑euro nations. She explains the complexities of LPG systems across borders, advising a refillable setup with three connector types. The video outlines mandatory European gear and paperwork (high‑vis jacket, warning triangle, etc.) and provides a downloadable checklist. Kat contrasts exclusive campsite bookings with the freedom of Aires motorhome parking spots, urging travelers to book popular sites well in advance. She discusses tolls and vignettes, recommending an electronic toll pass (e‑movis) to avoid manual payments. The segment on Angles‑Mor stickers clarifies when they are required and reassures viewers about driving on the opposite side of the road. Overloading is highlighted as a serious issue; Kat suggests using a UK weighbridge and managing water/fuel loads. Finally, she stresses researching public holidays—especially in France—to avoid closed services, and reminds viewers to perform thorough vehicle maintenance before departure. A link to a detailed Europe checklist and a separate video on the Schengen 90/180‑day rule are provided.
Chapters
Planning a trip to Europe? Make sure you don't make any of these 10 common mistakes. Hi, I'm Kat, and welcome to Wandering Bird, where we share tips and tricks for motorhoming and road trips. Now, I know a lot of you are planning epic adventures into Europe this year, and I wanted to share some of the most common mistakes that people make and a few that I have made myself. You ready? Let's dive in. Number 1: Verify your insurance coverage. This is so simple, and yet something so many people overlook. Usually, if you're in the UK, you've just got UK-only cover for your motorhome because most people don't go abroad, and then suddenly you decide you're gonna go abroad and you completely forget to upgrade or tell your insurance company. So if you are going to go abroad and you don't have European cover, make sure you get that added to your policy. You don't need to bring physical proof of your insurance, but you do need to make sure you know your insurance number just in case you have a little accident. Touch wood. Number 2, underestimating driving distances. Now, this is something I personally am So guilty of. It may sound obvious, but Europe is huge. Like, huge, huge. And you sort of look at a map and go, yeah, I can do 500 miles each day, not a problem at all. And you can, that's perfectly doable, but you're not going to see anything if you do that much driving. Don't forget, of course, that there are 2 ways you can approach your tour. You can either choose to use motorways or toll roads, and they are generally going to be quicker, but you're not going to see so much of the country that you're exploring. Or you can take the slower, more scenic route, But it's the slower, more scenic route, which means you're not going to travel so far in however much time you've got each day to travel. And that's how I would organize your trip. Say I want to go 2 or 3 hours driving. I don't recommend you do many days more driving than that because it does get really tiring. And just go as far as you can. Now, if you don't have to book all your campsites up in advance, it really helps if you can use the Aire system or something like that. You can choose how far you want to travel each day. If the weather's not great, you don't want to drive very far, that's fine. Or if the weather's amazing and you want to stay and use that time to explore outside, you've got much more flexibility if you just go on the number of hours you want to drive rather than the actual miles you want to cover. I find that puts me under so much pressure. Oh, I've got to do another 100 miles before I can have a break, and that's not a good mental place to be driving a large motorhome in. Number 3: Assuming that every country in Europe uses the euro. They do not. Most countries in the EU use the euro, but not every country in Europe is in the EU. Us included. Other notable countries, and I'm going to read my list here to make sure I get it right, that don't use the euro in Europe are Norway because they're not in the EU, and then you've also got Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Sweden, and of course us. Number 4, not having a plan for your LPG. Now whether you use refillable bottles or whether you use exchangeable bottles, they will not work the same in Europe as they do in the UK, and I am so guilty. This is one of the biggest mistakes that I made when I first started touring Europe was I didn't I realized that the connectors we have in the UK don't work or don't fit anything else in the rest of Europe. Shocking, I know. Even better, the ones in France aren't the same as the ones in Germany, and the ones in Germany aren't the same as the ones in Spain. It's all good, it's all good. So if you have refillable systems, whether that's a refillable tank or refillable bottles, and that is by far your easiest option, you need to make sure you've got 3 different types of connectors that go on the nozzle for the refillable systems. And then when you fit— get your system fitted, whatever system you choose to go with, Flow— I've got Flow Gas. Have I got Flow Gas? I don't know which one I've got. Big yellow ones. Is it called Flow Gas? I'm losing my marbles. I can't remember the name of my bottles. Anyway, when I got them fitted, they had a pack for Europe, so that had the 3 little nozzles. You just screw them in depending on the country that you're in, and you can get the nozzle to fit onto your UK system. Easy peasy. If you've got exchangeable bottles, what you need to do is take pigtails, which are basically the hoses that go from the bottle into your system, into the motorhome, and you will have to change the little pigtail hose depending on the country that you were in to fit the bottle that you have got. Don't forget, of course, if you are doing an exchangeable bottle, you're probably going to have to leave one of your UK bottles behind unless you only take one with you, assuming you've got space for 2 in your van. And then you're going to have to pay the deposit to get the new bottle. You're going to have to give some sort of address, although some places do take a campsite address. And then if you go from one country to another country, those systems aren't going to work either. So you're either going to have to leave that exchangeable bottle behind in the new country and then pay again the deposit and go through the whole system all over again, or it all gets very confusing, which is why if you're going to do a lot of touring in Europe, I would suggest investing in a refillable system. It's so much simpler. And I know things are a little bit tough in the UK at the moment, but they are— although they might be disappearing from service stations, there are plans in place apparently for motorhome centres and other things to get LPG tanks fitted. So I don't believe it's going to be absolutely Absolutely dire. I've still got a refillable system in my van and I'm planning on keeping it that way for now. Number 5, not bringing the correct gear with you when you go into Europe. There are rules in Europe about things that you have to have. You have to carry certain things in your van, like a high-vis jacket and a warning triangle and loads of other stuff that we don't have here in the UK. If you want a full free checklist of everything you need so you don't forget anything, I'll leave the link below. You can find that from the Wandering Bird website. You can just download that and tick it all off as you go to make sure you've got everything that you need. The same also applies with a little bit of paperwork, but that's on that checklist as well. Number 6, only using campsites. So I mentioned this briefly before when you're planning a route, but if you only use campsites, you miss a little bit of the freedom and the flexibility that Europe is so amazing for. Seriously, I love motorhoming around Europe, and one of the biggest reasons for that is because it's so easy to make it up as you go along and wander and wing it, as I say. But you can, because of the Aires system, which are approved motorhome parking spots. I'll leave a video here somewhere, wherever the link comes up, about all about what the Aires are and how you use them and how you find them, but they make it So easy to travel from place to place without booking a campsite months in advance. Of course, if you don't want to travel around and you just want to go to one place and you want to be by a beach or by a place with a swimming pool or somewhere with a surf school or something like that, or near Euro Disney, book that up. Book that up as far in advance you possibly can because places like that book up so far. And if you don't want to tour around, that's absolutely fine, but just be aware that you will have to book that up far in advance, especially if you're going on the school holidays. Number 7, not having a system for the tolls or the vignettes. Now, I'm not talking about Crit'Air stickers here. I'm talking about tolls or vignettes, which is the price that you pay for using motorways across Europe. So places like France have tolls, places like Switzerland have a vignette system. If you're going to use the tolls, especially if you're traveling on your own and you have a right-hand drive like I do, I highly recommend you get a little toll beeper thing, toll pass. I use e-movis. They're brilliant. You just have it up there in the windscreen. And it beeps as you go through and they charge you and on you, on you go. Otherwise you have to do that crazy dash where you jump out on the right-hand side, you run around to the left, you pay for the toll, then the barrier comes up, then you come back to the van. It's all very exciting. So getting a toll pass removes all of that. Vignettes aren't so much of an issue because obviously you pull up if you're going to go to a border or you go to a garage or gas station, you can pay for them there. It's not such an issue, especially if you're traveling on your own, but make sure you do have a system for the tolls. Number eight. Number eight, worrying too much about things like Angle Mor stickers or driving on the wrong side of the road. So Angle Mor stickers, if you're not over three and a half tons, disregard them completely. If you are over three and a half tons and you're not going through France apart from that tiny little bit off the tunnel before you head into Belgium or Germany, don't worry about them. The only time you need to worry about Angle Mor stickers is if you're going into built-up areas in France. So if you're going to be spending, I don't know, a few days in France and you're going to go into built-up areas. Then yes, put an Angle Mort sticker if your vehicle is over 3.5 tonnes. You can just put them on with Blu Tack or sticky pads or something like that so that you can then take them off again easy. Not magnetic ones, your van's not magnetic. And as for driving on the wrong side of the road, within about 20 minutes you'll be absolutely fine. Don't forget that the road system in Europe is set up to be on the other side of the road, so all the roundabouts got arrows on, all the flows work that way. You don't have to think about it as much as you think you do. Um, I've always had a right-hand drive vehicle, I've never worried about it. The only The only time it can be a little bit difficult when you're traveling on your own is when you're behind a slow-moving vehicle on a single-track lane. You have to do that scary pull out. Oh my goodness, there's a lorry coming, pull back in again. That's the only time when it's a real problem, but otherwise driving in Europe is great. Like I say, within a short period of time, you're not gonna notice any difference from driving in the UK. The trouble comes when you come back to the UK and you have that moment like, can't remember what side of the road I'm supposed to be on. You have to really think about it, but otherwise you'll be brilliant. I promise you, it's not that scary. Number 9, being overloaded. So many people don't think about the weight of their van, and Although in the UK we don't get that many checks, I'm not going to say never because I know a few people have been, but we don't have as many checks. But in Europe they do, especially on the main roads, and they do pull foreign motorhomes over, and they do have the little weigh pads, scales, where they can tell how much your vehicle weighs, and they will make you take stuff off your motorhome, leave it at the side of the road before you can continue your journey. So please, please, when you have packed up your vehicle, make sure you take it to a weighbridge somewhere in the UK. Make sure you're not overweight. Don't forget, of course, you don't have to drive with a full water tank, and If you're going somewhere like the mountains, I don't recommend that you do, and you don't have to drive with a full fuel tank. Although again, if you're going to the mountains, I do recommend that you do. That's a lot of weight if you have a full water tank and a full fuel tank. So you can reduce the weight in those in order to have extra weight elsewhere, but please make sure you're not overloaded. Otherwise, it can invalidate your insurance and mean that you have to leave a load of stuff behind in Europe. And lastly, one of the biggest mistakes that people make when they are touring Europe for the first time is not researching public holidays. France especially are notorious for their public holidays. Everything shuts down. Everything shuts down. You might be able to get fuel at a main motorway service station, but otherwise no shops, no bakeries, no boulangeries, nothing is open on public holidays, which can make it really difficult if you haven't brought certain types of food over and you need it, and then you suddenly arrive and it's a public holiday. Definitely something to think about that a lot of people forget. So make sure you research the public holidays on the countries that you're going to be in or driving through. And lastly, as a little bonus tip, a lot of people forget to do proper checks. So make sure before you go, done all your maintenance checks, make sure your vehicle's ready for your long drive. Again, if you want a checklist for this to help you remember to go through everything on your van, I'll leave it in the links below along with the Europe checklist. Now, if you are heading to Europe and you're confused about the Schengen Zone, the 90 and 180-day rule, watch this video. It will explain exactly how the process works and how you can keep track of it in a really simple way. I hope you found that video useful. If you've got any other tips or comments, please do leave them below, and I'll see you on the next video. Take care. Bye. Bye.
