Traveling off season (camper van) - Living the PACO life

We started our motorhome trip in mid-September 2021. September marks the end of the season. The summer holidays are over and most tourist spots are getting quieter. We have never travelled by motorhome in summer before, at first we thought we would like it much better. Warm weather, everything open, lots of people. But now that we have travelled in the off-season, we have come to really appreciate this too. Lisa – Written: 17-03-2022.

Advantages of off-season motorhome travel

All the spots are quiet, making it easy to camp wild and put your campervan in the most beautiful places. Because there are not 10 other campers parked there, locals and police often don’t mind you spending the night somewhere.

You have private beaches and at tourist sites it is also a lot quieter which gives you a completely different experience. It sometimes feels like you are alone in the world when you are camping somewhere alone in the middle of nature. We find this really cool. The prices are often a bit lower in restaurants or when you look for a campsite to take a shower and wash your clothes. I feel you experience more local life because you often go to touristy places when you go on holiday. Then you experience less how a country and its people live. Tourists who come to Amsterdam often also talk about weed or the redlights but that doesn’t show what the rest of the Netherlands is like either. Because the tourist towns are often closed, go to the local villages and towns here you see how the locals live, they don’t treat you like a tourist here but are genuinely interested in the trip you are making. Because there are fewer other tourists, you also have more contact with people from the country itself.

Disadvantages of off-season motorhome travel:

But there are definitely some drawbacks too. It depends where you go but in Europe the weather can be very changeable in winter. So you do need to prepare for some cold. You can certainly have beautiful, sunny days but if you are camping somewhere in the mountains, it can also get very cold, especially at night. We were not well prepared for this. Autumn and spring can be very beautiful months with lots of sunshine in southern countries. So this certainly doesn’t have to be something that stops you, but it is something to think about and prepare for. Many tourist spots are closed, we hadn’t thought of it beforehand, but in Greece, for example, the coastal towns sometimes look like ghost towns because they live mainly from tourism and are therefore closed during the off-season. There is also something special about walking through a beautiful town on your own. But don’t expect a nice lunch at a nice restaurant because they are often closed. You encounter fewer other people with a camper van. Especially in Albania, we almost always camped alone at places. This is nice, but sometimes it’s also nice to meet other camper van owners. And for people who like camping, it is also inconvenient. Most campsites are closed during the winter period. We occasionally grab a campsite to shower and do laundry but found out that this is sometimes difficult. so it is wise to call the campsite to ask if they are open.

So we really enjoyed travelling off-season. We really liked the fact that everywhere was not so crowded and we could stay overnight with our camper almost anywhere. A beautiful beautiful beach all to yourself, who wouldn’t want this? But we also finished it sometimes because it rained for days on end or it was cold. We have now had a Heather built in to make the evenings a bit more comfortable. Even if you go after the sun as we planned, the nights can be very cold. In another blog post we will explain which heater we chose and why. So it’s a good idea to look up in advance where you are going and what the weather is doing in those months. Then you can prepare for this. It can often be very different whether you are in the mountains or the coast. And you need to be lucky enough to have a good winter. Want to see some atmospheric impressions? Then check out some Instagram REELS here:

Reel 1 (Click)
Reel 2 (Click)
Reel 3 (Click)

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