One of the major problems we Motorhome owners have in the UK is finding somewhere to park your Motorhome when you want to visit a town or tourist site or even to pick up some food from the supermarket.

This is a common problem in the UK but it is much less of a problem in other parts of Europe. France is one of the most Motorhome friendly countries we have visited and the local authorities and leading supermarkets actually value our business and encourage Motorhome parking.

It is certainly true that there are far more options for parking your Motorhome in Europe than the UK and they don’t have the parking wardens hovering on every street corner trying to catch motorists at any given opportunity in order to decorate their windscreen with a parking ticket.

Another example of how difficult parking can be is that even if you can get into a pay and display car park they usually don’t have extra large bays to accommodate larger vehicles such as Motorhomes so what do you do then? If you take up two bays you run the risk of being fined especially if you overhang a bay. I have seen car park signs that advise doing this but then purchasing two tickets for the privilege which is a solution of a kind but expensive.

We are members of the National Trust and we do find that when visiting their homes that the majority of their car parks are Motorhome friendly although an early arrival is recommended. In any case you can always check by giving them a ring first.

Prior to visiting a town for the first time you can also look at the website of the local authority and that will sometimes tell you if there are special parking arrangements for Motorhomes.

There is a really useful site that has a great deal of information on Motorhome Friendly and Unfriendly Parking and advice on a regional basis and it is well worth a look.

If anyone has had a bad experience with Motorhome parking please share it with the rest of us and if you’ve found a solution then let us know – we’ll all be eternally grateful.