Date:         Tue, 4 Feb 2003 21:48:12 -0800
Reply-To:     Nolan Hester <waywest@EARTHLINK.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Nolan Hester <waywest@EARTHLINK.NET>
Subject:      Re: Question re buying & selling a westfalia in Europe
In-Reply-To:  <200302042051.18GhwN4E3NZFlr0@killdeer>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"

We rented a Eurovan Westfalia (a T4) from B & W's Amsterdam office
for two weeks in May 2001 and found them to be reasonbly priced and
good to deal with. The Euro-dollar ratio has gotten worse since then,
however. At the time it was much cheaper than staying in hotels and
eating in restaurants. We'd buy fresh stuff at the local open air
markets, saving our eating-out dollars for the really special
dinners. The real advantage, however, was that we didn't have to plan
out our whole trip in advance and, instead, could follow our nose and
the roads day by day.

BTW, the "Eurovan" camper in Europe is called the "California," which
just goes to show ya that the name is always greener on the other
side of the pasture.

Nolan-WayWest
87 Westfalia

>Date:    Wed, 5 Feb 2003 07:55:43 +1030
>From:    Bob Bolton <bobbol@ADAM.COM.AU>
>Subject: Re: Question re buying & selling a westfalia in Europe
>
>There's a mob in Amsterdam called Braitman and Woudenberg (I think) who run an
>excellent web site on just this issue.  They sell ex-rentals and will buy them
>back from you after a period for a percentage of what you paid.  This also
>overcomes certain insurance problems. Their site includes an analysis of
>whether this is better than renting, for various periods.
>
>Bob
>
>Quoting Scott Norville <kr2no@EARTHLINK.NET>:
>
>>  The last time we went, we rented a beautiful TDI Eurowesty ("California")
>>  from a nice company outside Zurich for three weeks. The main pick-up points
>>  for VW camper rentals seem to be Amsterdam, Paris, Hamburg or Zurich, and
>>  there was a place in Amsterdam that still rented loafs and splits. In
>>  retrospect, and three years ago, we figured that for a stay over four weeks
>>  shipping (on a RoRo boat--roll on, roll off) our own van from New Orleans or
>>  somewhere on the east coast would have been cheaper in total (including
>>  shipping it back, around $1000 each way). Shipping in a container is much
>>  more expensive. Either way, you will have a lot of fun.
>>
>  > Scott