Some Details for the Trips, 1989, 1991, 1995

Seventh Trip — 1989

We returned to Europe about three months later. The Renault started just fine, and we were ready to travel 8,700 miles through 10 countries with 77 nights in campsites, out of a total of 115 nights in Europe. Most memorable was the night we drove the RV onto a ship, an elevator took the RV, and us, to the top deck. We prepared our meals and camped at the rail as the ship sailed the Adriatic from Brandisi, Italy, past the Greek Islands to Patra, Greece. An outstanding campsite.

We sold the Renault RV to a dealer in Saarbrücken, Germany for $9,300. That means we paid $2,700 for 245 days and 17,100 miles of driving, 147 days cooking, and 147 nights of sleeping, during the two trips that we owned this vehicle. Add the cost of a couple of tires (one near Bordeaux, France, the other at Agrínio, Greece) and a front brake job in Merzig, Germany, and it cost maybe $13 per day, about the cost of renting a bicycle.

When we returned home this time we found a Visa bill listing all of our charges for about a month in Italy. We computed our overall average travel cost per day (plane tickets, campsites, groceries, RV, etc.), subtracted the cost to live at home, and determined we had spent nearly a month in Italy, from the Alps and including several days on the Island of Sicily, for $15 to $20 per day more than it would have cost to just stay home.

Eighth Trip — 1991

This is the only time we rented an RV for our trip through Europe. We rented from the same company that had purchased our Renault in 1989, and they gave us an excellent price of $50 per day. We were in Europe 78 days, spent 53 nights in the RV, drove 6,800 miles and visited six countries.

Ninth Trip — 1995

This time we bought an RV with a buy-back provision. That would have been just great, but while we were in Europe the Dollar/D-Mark exchange rate changed for the worst, and our cost was about $60 per day. We drove 5,300 miles through eight countries, and spent 55 nights (total of 107 in Europe) in the RV.