The first leg took us down through hot and sunny Germany and into cool and wet Austria. Overnights were in Bonn, the Black Forest, some random farm near Lake Constance on the Germany-Austria border and another quirky wee place in the Austrian Alps.

We had planned to stop for a few days in the Dolomites but unfortunately as we were arriving in the area the weather was poor with lots of rain forecast so we reluctantly decided to skip the mountains and follow the weather further south to bag a few sunny Italian cities.

We passed though Bolzano and made our next overnight stop, on Richard's recommendation, at Mantua. There, we visited Palazzo Ducali and were both underwhelmed. The next morning we visited Palazzo Te and were overwhelmed - it was superb.

Next was Modena, via the train station at Reggio Emilia (another Richard suggestion) and the fantatastic Ferarri museum. Then we took a local train into Bologna having stayed the night at a wonderfully quirky farm site a few miles from the city. We wandered the city and visited the Carlo Scarpa building that Richard had told us about.

From there it was to the outskirts of Florence and another tiny little farm site, with ostriches and other animals running around and providing entertainment in front of the van. Another train took us into Florence and it was majestic as expected, the highlight being the view of the city from high up on Giardino Bardini.

For the last destination in Italy we drove west towards the coast and stayed on a great wee campsite with a welcome little swimming pool, positioned perfectly between Lucca and Pisa. We spend two nights on the site here visiting the two little cities and enjoying both.

The final Italian leg towards Provence in France meant hugging the Mediterranean coast on the motorway though more than 100 tunnels on this amazing piece of civil engineering. This fairly long journey was broken at Ceriale for the final night in Italy - and another lovely swimming pool.

The Room of the Giants in Palazzo Te was utterly memorable and the standout room for both of us. The artworks combined beautifully with the curved walls and ceiling blurring the lines between all. At the end of our visit I went back to photograph as much of it as possible so that it could be studied later at leisure. Having this many photos of the same subject seemed to merit its own small album.

We visited the Ferrari museum in Modena. I'm not "into" Ferrari in the traditional sense and I certainly don't know the model names and numbers like many may do. However, the museum was a wonderful visit and the cars truly are works of art and things of beauty - well most of them. I was drawn to the earlier, classical sixties and seventies models. The museum's tour was a musical one - connecting the cars to their musical owners with soundtracks to go alongside. The stories were as much, if not more, about the famous owners than the cars themselves and this modesty made the visit all the more special. At one point the lights dimmed and the great modern catherdral to motoring became an iMax-like cinema telling the moving story of the famous founder Enzo Ferrari. His was a life well lived, scattered as it was with so many memorable quotations; "Ask a child to draw a car and it will be red.".

Richard told us there was a small Scarpa restored building in the centre of Bolgona so we hunted it down and, as requested, took a few photos for him. It's now a smart vintage clothes shop and is respectfully laid out. The changing room, in particular, was quite special. We had a fantastic Bolognese lunch on the pavement cafe right outside.

One of the subjects street photographers like to look for is "gestures". Well, thanks to the (brain-dead) Instagram generation, the Leaning Tower of Pisa is the gift that keeps on giving. It may appear we spent quite some time collecting this lot. In fact, these photos were all taken within just a few minutes of each other on a random Sunday morning stroll through the crowds. There is an infinite supply.

We were always going to include France in any European campervan tour. Our route from the south to the north of France included overnights and kind hospitality from Stuart in Calvisson near Montpellier and Mark in Sciez on the south shore of Lake Geneva. We stopped in the Ardeche for an epic day of kayaking down the gorge, and Morzine in the Alps for some fantastic hillwalking in perfect weather. Further north, we stopped overnight in Troyes making sure we had a decent enough network connection to stream the Scotland Haiti match in the middle of the night. We did. Just. The last night in France was spent in St Omer for a memorable birthday dinner, stopping on the way there for a while to wander the beautiful city of Reims.

Ovenight tour locations in the van. One city street, one rustic Italian layby, three farm sites, six car parks, four campsites, a ski slope and one English pub. Three in Germany, one in Austria, six in Italy, five in France and the one English pub.

There were also three out of van nights: a night on the ferry to Amsterdam; a night with Stuart in the south of France; and one with Mark in Sciez.