Tag: Europe

I wanted To write this blog to not only summarise our trip, but also give a bit of advice where I can about travelling around Europe.

The highlights

Thinking about things that stuck out on our trip, I’d have to say that most of Efteling, Rookburgh and the Charles Lindbergh, most of Toverland and The Ride to Happiness as a start. So to make it a bit more fun, I think I’ll go through highlights of anything and everything starting with the coasters.

The Coasters

Fury and Ride to Happiness are the clear standouts here. I was expecting Ride to Happiness to be great but wasn’t expecting as much from Fury but it sure delivered! Anubis was also noteworthy, as was Typhoon and Taron. Kondaa was quite impressive too, Revolution and Psyke Underground were very interesting and Troy is the best wooden coaster I’ve ridden so far!

The Flats

But rollercoasters aren’t just all a park has to offer, there’s the flat rides too. Here, the clear standouts was Talocan. I looked forward to this for a long time before going and it held up all I wanted it to be! I wish the fire had been working on our visit but it didn’t take away from what is a phenomenal ride. Mystery Castle is also a ride that I’ll never forget riding the first time either! Then there’s King Kong at Bobbejaanland, Le Rondes des Canards at Plopsaland and Scorpius at Toverland for how great it looked.

The Dark Rides

Then there’s the great selection of dark rides we had a go on! Popcorn Revenge, Challenge of Tutankhamen, Maus Au Chocolat, Carnival Festival, Droomvluct and the almighty Symbolica! Efteling truly is one of the dark ride capitals of Europe!

The Water Rides

Finally there’s the water rides, though Pulsar and SuperSplash are rollercoasters, I think they stand out more for their water elements. Though the rapids rides we had a go on are definitely memorable, River Quest being the absolute champion of rapids rides! Chiapas is the best log flume we’ve been on, but Flashback and Terra Magna were great too!

As for the park that stood out as the one that impressed me most, it’ll definitely be Toverland. Though Efteling and Phantasialand were the better parks, I felt that Toverland was so well done and we enjoyed everything there was to do at the park so much. I feel Efteling could do with a few more thrill rides personally and that would make it easily top of all parks I’ve visited. For now though, Toverland is up there along with Efteling and Phantasialand, with Walibi Belgium and Plopsaland being tied and Bobbejaanland being slightly behind those two. That’s definitely not to say Bobbejaanland was bad or anything, far from it! It’s better than the vast majority of parks here in the UK! It’s just competition is stiff!

All the hotels we stopped in were not much to write about besides the Loonsche Land Hotel and Charles Lindbergh which were very well done. It is worth noting though, that most of the hotels we stopped in didn’t have tea and coffee making facilities and the beds all seemed to use foam mattresses too. I suppose I should really mention Schwerelos Suite here as the host of this overnight stop went truly above and beyond with how they accommodated us!

Some advice about Europe

I’ll have an accompanying video for you to watch here if you prefer, but I’ll try and go into a bit of detail here as it’s easier to write!

The first piece of advice I’d say is to make sure you plan what you’re doing to within an inch of its life! I had an Excel spreadsheet with all sorts of information on it while we were going through the motions of deciding what parks we were doing, what hotels we were stopping at and our route. We ended up deciding on 6 parks and 9 hotels in total (2 being booked alongside their park tickets). The route we decided on was the most fuel efficient way that I could find as I used Google Maps to decide what was best.

Once we’d gotten our actual hotels and tickets booked, we turned our attention to what we’d need. This includes your V5 for the car, travel insurance, car insurance details (including European cover), passports and such. I’ll make a list at the very bottom to help out with what you might need to make it much easier to plan! It’s also worth noting how you’re getting there. By road you’ll have 2 choices, ferry or Eurotunnel. We opted for the Eurotunnel as it was a lot cheaper, but the ferry might have offers on or be more suitable to you.

Driving in Europe wasn’t as scary as I thought it would be as you are guided straight onto a french motorway as you leave the eurotunnel and it sort of clicks as you go. The first few roundabouts are interesting as cars are coming from the other way and you are used to looking right instead of left.

Having a basic understanding of French/Dutch or German will help you out plenty in France/Belgium/The Netherlands and Germany and it certainly helps if you have allergies or specific needs as we had a little issue with onions. I’m not allergic to them per se but they can seriously upset my stomach and it’s much easier to not eat them at all. We did had a few issues trying to say ‘no onions please’, but it didn’t always come across, which is on us for not knowing how to speak a foreign language!

Obviously the currency is Euros and I took a bank card with me, where Tracy went entirely cash. Either works fine and depending where you’re going depends on what you’ll need. Bobbejaanland for example is entirely cashless so you can convert cash into their own on park currency, but Phantasialand was easier with cash as some of the vendors didn’t take card.

Things you’ll need for driving in Europe

• Passport
• Travel Insurance
• Car Insurance
• V5C
• High Viz Jacket for each occupant of the vehicle )reachable from within the behicle)
• First Aid Kit
• Warning Triangle (for breakdowns)
• GB Sticker on rear of car
• Beam Deflectors
• Clothes
• Toiletries
• Suncream
• Medication
• Camera(s)
• Travel Towel
• Bottled Water