Camping in Europe

Anyone here a camper? (TENT camping, not giant RV/caravans).

Wifey and I are looking at doing a week camping trip through Belgium-Holland-northwest France in July. But I'm concerned that we might not be able to find a camping pitch given the summer school holidays.  We like to travel spontaneously without making pre-arranged reservations. How difficult is it to find a campgrounds in continental Europe?  Costs?  Is "roadside" camping allowed? (i.e. pitch after dark, be gone by morning).  I found a few websites but none really answered my questions.

Our plan is to take the train from London to Dover, then ferry to Calais, and hire a car in Calais then just drive around randomly for a week! 

We camp, but have only done it in the UK so far. We'd love to go over to France and do it, though, so let me know what you find out!

Not a whole lot of help but..

We've been camping here in Greece on the islands. . . but never in Belgium-Holland-France. I would love to hear how it goes as DH and I love to camp and travel around with no real sense of where we are going

Last summer we left for the islands w/ only the names of a few campgrounds and had no trouble finding a (nice) spot during August and the prices were very reasonable. I know this isn't a lot of help for you but just to give you a sense..

Good Luck, it sounds like great fun!

We use this site to check out other campers' reviews of UK campsites: http://www.ukcampsite.co.uk/

They don't have a search option for European campsites, but the forum does have a section for overseas camping. I haven't had a look at it, but it might help you out.

Hi ya'll. We just got back from our Euro camping trip!  If you're interested in reading our full report, complete with tips and advice, visit our blog at http://www.twocrabs.com.

I won't bore you by posting it all here as it's quite long and full of pictures!

thanks for sharing!! I like your writing style.

I overlanded parts of Eastern and Southern Africa. It was always an adventure to pack up and set up in a new destination.