Author - Lorraine Stokes

I consider myself a Brightonian having lived there for almost half my life but I'm originally from Portsmouth.

I studied Social Work and practised as a children's Social Worker in the local authorities in and around Brighton.

I'm interested in vegetarian food, am a supporter of animal welfare, LGBTQ rights and health and wellbeing. I love riding, running, yoga, mediation and property development when I can fit it all into my busy lifestyle!! I also love partying. My biggest loves of course are Marley and Dan.

Lovely Lucerne in Switzerland

August 29, 2018Lorraine Stokes5 min read

28/8/18 – 29/8/18 – Lucerne We visited Hergiswill, Switzerland for one night which is located just a few miles from the lovely Lucerne. We followed Google Maps to our free location, which we knew was up a very high hill, but hadn’t quite bargained for the steep accent  that we got. As I sat tense in my seat trying to enjoy the amazing views surrounding us, whilst thinking this can’t be the right place, we reached a construction site on a very small ledge of a mountain side and became stuck behind a jeep with a trailer!  I won’t say what words actually came out our mouths! Fortunately the jeep was moving out of the only space where it would be possible for us to turn around, and out I hopped to help Dan manoeuvre the van around the tiny bend, turning us back to face the direction we came in. He did it so well, and was remarkable calm. Must be getting used to it. When we could, we pulled over and re-entered the GPS into Apple Maps, and low and behold it...

Meeting the Marvelous Moho “Mamma Mia’s” at Maggiore (Lake)

August 26, 2018Lorraine Stokes7 min read

23/08/18 – 26/08/18 – Lake Maggiore, Piedmont and Lombardy Regions After 2 months of not staying at a campsite, it felt odd checking into one. Having said this, Camping Village Conca d’Oro in Lake Maggiore was properly organised and the staff were super friendly on arrival. (GPS 45.9361943,8.4867615) There was a major difference to staying at one this time though, as we were meeting our friends who also had their Moho. We’d booked 3 nights at the campsite situated on the edge of Lake Maggiore where Adele and Charlotte had already been for several days with their beautiful children Toby, Ella and Woody the dog. Adele, Chief Organiser, had already prepped us a few days prior via a little video about how our vans would come together to create our “nest”. We were all very excited, and after several hugs and kisses on arrival, Dan manoeuvred our van into position, opposite their van, side by side with our awnings sort of coming together in the middle to...

The Magical Waters of Lake Annecy

August 22, 2018Lorraine Stokes3 min read

21/8/18 – 22/8/18 – Lake Annecy, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region On arrival at Lake Annecy the heavens opened up so there was no way we were going outside until it stopped. Instead we snuggled up inside, watched everyone else getting drenched and enjoyed our view overlooking the town with our fellow moho-ers! (GPS 45.8928362,6.1267976) The rain lasted the whole night! Lots of cars came and went throughout the evening and night, so we could see why we’d read a review saying this spot maybe popular for dogging! Quite amusing seeing so its the church carpark. We did see a few people going in and out of each other’s Moho, and giggled about it perhaps being a moho wife swap spot (not us, thank you very much). Joking aside,this free spot was actually great, we felt safe and it was a 10 minute walk downhill to the historical centre, which is what we did the following morning. Annecy is a stunning little town with lots of canals and bridges adorned with flowers, and surrounded by...

Another Day, Another Lake – Lac des Moines

August 21, 2018Lorraine Stokes3 min read

20/08/18-21/08/18 – Lac des Moines, Auvergne Region We headed to Lac des Moines within the Auvergne Regional Park as it seemed a good place to take a rest from driving given it’s halfway between Lake Vassiviere (our last destination) and our next destination. It turned out to be a great place to stop. We stayed a night right on the waters edge, and had our own little place to sit and have a few beers in the sun. The lake is very pretty and there is a little beach, a few bars and restaurants, and activities such as a swimming pool and pedalos. We’d read that someone would come and collect €5 but that never happened, so that was a bit of a bonus. There were toilets close by too, which is always handy if your own toilet is getting close to its capacity. Eeeew! (GPS 45.8935849,3.5991149) We mostly chilled and strolled around the lake. I went for a run in the morning, which was great for me, however, it wasn’t so much fun for Dan who had to deal with Marley going...

A Great City Stop – Bordeaux

August 15, 2018Lorraine Stokes4 min read2 comments

14/08/18 – 15/08/18 – Bordeaux, Aquitaine Region Before visiting Bordeaux neither of us had any idea what it would be like, we only really knew about its association with wine production, so we didnt have any expectations of the city. We were very pleasantly surprised by what we found. We stayed approximately 3 miles from the historical centre, at the marina. Not being a big fan of McDonalds, the fast food chain, I was disappointed to see Dan’s slightly restrained excitement on noticing one right next door to us. However, I have to admit that when he bought me an egg McMuffin for breakfast the following day, I was pretty happy. The area we stayed was a bit run down and dirty, but during our stay we felt safe amongst the other motorhomes. It was free and there was a good view of the marina from our window so we certainly didn’t complain. There were no services, but we’re always prepared for that. (GPS. 44.8694306,-0.5641556) Modern Area On our first night...

Amongst the Cider Apple Trees – Astigarra (San Sebastian)

August 13, 2018Lorraine Stokes2 min read

12-08-18 – 13-08-18 – Astigarra (San Sebastian), Basque Country We were really looking forward to hanging out on the beautiful beaches in San Sebastian, but when we got to the city’s arena where we knew we could park for free, we realised something must be going on. The arena was cordoned off and there were lots of Police around. Dan quickly did an internet search and found out that we’d only gone and arrived during the week of Semana Grande. This is a huge Spanish festival of music arts, dance and religion that goes on for a whole week, and it was obvious to us that whatever was going on at the arena was part of the festivities. Clearly we were not going to be able to park there, but it seems at other times of the year, it would be perfectly fine.  We had planed to ride the 20 minutes into the centre (GPS 43.297403, -1.970098) (approximately 2 miles), but with nowhere to park, we made another plan. Given all the other parking areas were closer to the centre...

Lovely Lierganes and Luscious Oriñón

August 10, 2018Lorraine Stokes4 min read

9/08/18 – 10-08/18 – Lierganes and Oriñón, Cantabria We’d talked about visiting Santander (prior to Lierganes) for several weeks before going there, although neither of us knew much about it other that it is a relatively new city given a huge fire destroyed much of it some years ago, and that there are several nice beaches surrounding it. Arriving into the city we felt uninspired by the many unattractive high rises and to top it off it was such a gloomy day with lots of rain. We arrived at our parking location, situated a few miles out of the centre, which on a sunny day would have looked lovely. We had a coffee to motivate ourselves for the walk in the rain, but then both admitted we really didn’t want to go. Again, i’m sure there was lots to see including the beaches but we felt that we wouldn’t be able to appreciate them on a day like today. Tired from the drive, we checked nearby locations and read lots of good things about Lierganes, so after half an hour...

Lazy Days in Gijon

August 7, 2018Lorraine Stokes3 min read

5/08/18 – 7/08/18 – Gijon, Asturias Region Playa El Rinconin is another doggie beach about 2 miles from the city of Gijon, which was our next destination. Like A’Coruna, on arrival to the free car/camper area (photo below) it was rammed and we had to park on a residential street for several hours until we got a space. Sometimes this feels like a pain in the arse because you just want to get settled. Fortunately a space appeared once most of the locals went home around 8pm, and we quickly got settled in for a couple of nights stay.(GPS 43.546927,-5.6373862,453) We checked the beach out which was quite a small cove, but it wasn’t that pleasing to Marley’s taste due to him not being able to run on the pebbles. We couldn’t either, so we didn’t actually spend much time on it. We were actually more pleasantly surprised and drawn to the well maintained park called Parque De El Rinconin. The grass was so green and there were neat rows of very high...

Free Willy time in A Coruña

August 3, 2018Lorraine Stokes3 min read

02/08/18 – 03/08/18 –  A Coruña, Galicia Region We chose A Coruna as a place to visit predominantly because of its cooler temperature compared to other parts of Spain (as Marley was struggling with the heat). It was definitely quite a bit cooler, but we weren’t quite prepared for how busy it was. Maybe it was a silly idea as we’d decided to try and stay at the car park to the Torre de Hercules (Tower of Hercules) a popular tourist attraction. So not surprisingly, lots of other mohos had already stolen many of the spaces. Still, it was worth getting up close to the ancient lighthouse that sits on A Coruna’s peninsula. Built in the late 1st century by the Romans, it underwent significant reconstruction in the 18th century and is the only functioning Roman lighthouse in use today. Having circled the lighthouse’s carpark in our moho about 4-5 times and after searching for about 40 minutes closeby, we almost left A Coruna for dust, but then came across a...

“I Like This Place and I Could Willingly Waste My Time In It” – Peneda-Gerés National Park

August 1, 2018Lorraine Stokes7 min read

30/07/18 – 1/08/18 – Peneda-Gerés National Park, Norte Region On the recommendation of Joao, one of our Portuguese followers, we headed to Peneda-Geres National Park. From Guimaraes we drove 40km North using non toll roads, and after carefully navigating some very bendy mountain roads, just over an hour later we arrived at our luscious green location. It was pretty evident why the region is called Costa Verde (Green Coast). Also known simply as Geres, Portugal’s only national park was created in 1971. The park covers a massive area, has several lakes, rivers, waterfalls and mountain peaks, which many come to climb (not us). The highest peak, I believe is named Geres at 1545 m. We found the above free site(GPS 41.6758424,-8.1845612) via our Park4night.com a website and app that we use sometimes to find mostly free places to stay. We were the only moho there on arrival, but a few others did come and go during our 2 day stay. It felt a little cheeky as this is...

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