I said do you speak-a my language. He just smiled ...

When we arrive at a campsite, it is Carol who usually visits reception. In Austria, the booking process is fairly straight forward and can be managed in German, if necessary; in Italy too we had learnt just enough Italian to get through the bureaucracy that Italian campsites required, which included photocopying passports. In Slovenia Carol's first question was always, ‘Govirite Anglesko?’ or do you speak English and fortunately this always got a positive response: One receptionist was so impressed by Carol’s five words of Slovenian, she exclaimed, ‘You speak very good Slovenian!’ This may reflect how little Slovenian most visitors speak.

After so many campsites, we have got to know what sort of pitch we prefer and we will spend a little time walking around the campsite looking for one that meets our needs. In the height of summer our priority is shade, followed by trees to fasten a washing line to and some privacy. A level pitch, a view and lush grass are important, but come further down the list. At the campsite in Grein on the banks of the Danube we moved pitches after one night just so that we could get better wi-fi reception.

The photograph shows the Danube at Grein, a pretty small town with an excellent bike shop.