French Camp Sites and Charging

[Gaz_]

Does anyone know of some EV Friendly (or even Tesla Friendly) camp sites in the Dordogne?

After this time spent in lockdown I'm thinking summer might be a road trip with a tent and I'd hate to have to pick the location based just on the nearest Supercharger.

I guess a bigger question is, is there any camp site search engines on line that include "EV friendly" as an option?

An another note since I'm slowed with my charging by chargegate, are most of the Superchargers people have tried in France near somewhere to get lunch or similar snacks or are they stand alone?

 

[markharro]

You're optimistic! I think it will be a big ask to get anywhere on holiday this year other than the UK. Having said that I would be interested to know too, even if its for next year's plans.

 

[Gaz_]

I found a couple of places that charge you an extra 5 euro's a night for an EV but no details on whether that just means you plug into a wall socket, a Commando or a Type 2

 

[Mr H]

Border crossings if you're not a resident will be very difficult for the next few months and even if they are relaxed i think most countries will require a 14 day isolation upon entry. I've written off this year for overseas travel and am considering the top of Scotland for later on.

 

[Gaz_]

This is getting slightly off topic, but the UK takes a lot of money abroad for tourism, a lot of countries are going to have to relax their quarantine to get that revenue in. There may be silly rules but I suspect some travel will be OK. I'm figuring Eurotunnel and tent means I don't share many/any germs

 

[markharro]

Silly rules - self isolate for 14 days on arrival in quarantine......just as that is finished - oh it's time to go home! I think that the only realistic option would be if we are eventually offered health passports based on proven immunity and that subject to the holiday country being happy to rely on these if issued abroad.

 

[Dickybeau]

Border crossings if you're not a resident will be very difficult for the next few months and even if they are relaxed i think most countries will require a 14 day isolation upon entry. I've written off this year for overseas travel and am considering the top of Scotland for later on.

Given what’s going on in Skye right now and the fact that it might take 6-8 weeks before the authorities can suppress it (optimistically) I’m not sure that anywhere in Scotland will be any more accessible than the continent in the coming 6 months. It’s probably worth listening in to the daily press conference that comes out of the Scottish government at 12.30 via the Scotgov.scot website. This paper issued today highlights the issues facing Scotland. It’s current position is not as good as hoped Coronavirus (COVID-19): framework for decision making - further information - gov.scot It’s worth looking at the chart on page 13 linked to the risks associated with school restart while the virus levels are so high in our communities here.
I know that some folk will take a constitutional position on this. Please don’t. We all need to consider how we prevent the spread of this virus which is likely to be about for some time

 

[Mr H]

The key word in my original post was 'considering' Being a key worker that has been working on a nightingale hospital a really don't need a lecture on how to behave.

 

[Dickybeau]

I wasn’t trying to lecture you. Indeed I’m hoping that everyone realises how bad this is and will be for some time to come. A lot of folk will be surprised to see limitations on travel coming down the line but they’re going to be essential to stop the spread of this condition. I’m a motorhome owner and walker/wildcamper. You wouldn’t believe the selfishness of some folk. The ferries eventually restricted travel to people who needed it and mountain rescue advised folk not to get on the hills. Folk are still posting their visits.
I’m gutted. We should be on our way to the ferry this week for 8 weeks in France and I haven’t bagged a Munro this year though conditions since lockdown have been unbelievable.

 

[zayn]

reading this there may already be a second worse mutation approaching

Coronavirus: Scientists say a more contagious mutant strain has been sweeping globe

 

[freekie]

We used superchargers at the Eurotunnel terminals and the service stations on the toll roads. When we stayed overnight in hotels we were not charged to use their chargers but they were not fast chargers. All Pre COVID.

 

[bitmanEV]

This is getting slightly off topic, but the UK takes a lot of money abroad for tourism, a lot of countries are going to have to relax their quarantine to get that revenue in.

Any prove of that statement?

 

[darkNstormy]

Silly rules - self isolate for 14 days on arrival in quarantine......just as that is finished - oh it's time to go home! I think that the only realistic option would be if we are eventually offered health passports based on proven immunity and that subject to the holiday country being happy to rely on these if issued abroad.

At the moment there is no evidence that being infected previously confers any long term immunity. So until that is proven one way or another it isn't gonna happen.

 

[M3noob]

At the moment there is no evidence that being infected previously confers any long term immunity. So until that is proven one way or another it isn't gonna happen.

There are some indications that the "re-infections" were a result of false positive tests (which are apparently legion)

 

[darkNstormy]

There are some indications that the "re-infections" were a result of false positive tests (which are apparently legion)

It's early days really. We are in uncharted territory from a medical point of view. It takes a long time to get reliable trial data. Most things published at the moment are pretty much just conjecture, with a bit of extrapolation from SARS and MERS. False negatives are more of a problem than false positives.

Nobody even knows what's going to happen to holiday destinations in the UK yet.

 

[Dickybeau]

It's early days really. We are in uncharted territory from a medical point of view. It takes a long time to get reliable trial data. Most things published at the moment are pretty much just conjecture, with a bit of extrapolation from SARS and MERS. False negatives are more of a problem than false positives.

Nobody even knows what's going to happen to holiday destinations in the UK yet.

I’m hoping that there are no holidays in the ‘U.K.’. I think the Skye situation with the significant outbreak in the care home shows how tricky dealing with this virus is right now. Skye is a popular destination fir holidays. Anyone thinking of going there right now is really needing their head examined. I’m seeing reports today of foreign registered cars pulling caravans up the A9. I can’t understand how that is allowed to happen without some kind of action. I’m certainly not planning leaving my area until we get some base line.

 

[Fly.guy]

Coming back to the actual question....

We have camped in France and charged at the pitch. It worked well and we never had any problems.

Most sites have electrical hook ups at each pitch and you pay extra to have them switched on. We took a 16a commando plug to 13a three pin UK socket converter which I made up. A long heavy duty extension lead and the standard UMC. A weather proof cover can be useful.. We generally charged at 8a. Not fast, but enough to cover local expeditions and suchlike and more than enough for our situation.

Bear in mind, France is pretty lax about swapping live and neutral and the UMC will not tolerate these the wrong way round. We just tried it out. If it worked, then fine. If not then I opened up the commando plug and swapped the live and neutral connections in the adapter to switch it back again. As long as your happy to wield a screwdriver it’s all fine.

 

[Traguar]

UMC 2 apparently copes fine with French wiring, just the older ones have the issue

 

[ringi]

This is getting slightly off topic, but the UK takes a lot of money abroad for tourism, a lot of countries are going to have to relax their quarantine to get that revenue in.

Hopefully the UK will require anyone who has been out of the UK to quarantine for 14 days on their return, and only wave the requirement once vaccination is over 80% in the UK. Afterall Italy showed us we can't depend on other countries not infecting UK holiday makers.

 

[Derek25]

Coming back to the original question, you don't need to rely on campsite charging. Most French towns and villages have 22kw chargepoints. Chargemap is a good place to start Chargemap - charging stations for electric cars Also, Macron has said there will be an announcement about summer holidays in France at the start of June. Currently, there is no requirement for arrivals from the UK to quarantine but you obviously have to meet the French regulations on necessary travel.