How much does motorhome touring really cost?
Fuel, ferries, campsites, aires, food and tolls: the real levers behind a motorhome trip budget, with real figures from our own trips wherever we have them, and an honest gap where we do not.
The short answer
There is no single "a motorhome trip costs X" figure, and we would not trust anyone who gave you one without caveats. The biggest lever is where you sleep, we have paid anywhere from free to €61 a night. The second biggest is fuel, which moves hard from country to country. Ferries and tolls are the costs that catch people out because they rarely show themselves until you are booking or already at the barrier.
Below is every real figure we can pull from our own trips, by category, plus the honest gaps we have not filled in yet rather than a guess.
We have been touring Europe in a motorhome for the better part of two decades, first as a young family and more recently with three boys who have grown into teenagers who eat like grown men. This is not a theoretical budget spreadsheet. Every figure below came out of a fuel receipt, a toll booth, an aire or a campsite we actually stayed on, or the odd supermarket receipt. Where we could not find a solid number in our own archive, we have said so rather than invent one.
Fuel: what it really costs
The cost that moves the most
Fuel is the cost that swings hardest from one trip to the next, and even from one country to the next inside the same trip. We have paid 184.9p a litre in Belgium and £103.02 for 75 litres in Croatia in the same summer, for a van built and driven the same way both times. There is no single "fuel costs X per trip" number we can give you honestly, because we have never seen it stay the same twice.
What does move it: your van's weight and length (our current 5.5 tonne coachbuilt drinks more than the 3.0 litre Kon-Tiki we used to run, which returned 22 to 23 miles to the gallon), how fast and how far you drive each day, and which countries you are filling up in. Fuel duty and pump prices vary a great deal across Europe, and it is worth watching the board rather than assuming your home country's price applies everywhere else.
Fill up strategically. We have learned to top the tank up in countries where fuel is cheap rather than waiting until the gauge runs low, and to keep an eye on pump prices as we cross borders rather than fuelling on autopilot.
Ferries: the number we are still chasing
The one gap we have not filled yet
The ferry or Tunnel crossing is usually the single biggest one-off cost of a European motorhome trip, and it is also the cost we can be least precise about here. Fares move with your van's length and height, the season, the route and how far ahead you book, so a figure from one of our own bookings would not tell you much about yours.
What we can tell you from our own bookings is the shape of the decision. The direct crossing from Portsmouth or Plymouth to Santander or Bilbao with Brittany Ferries is the more expensive way in, but it drops you into northern Spain rested rather than after two days of French motorway. The shorter Channel crossing is cheaper and quicker to book, but adds driving days if your destination is further south. We generally weigh the ferry cost against the diesel, tolls and time a longer drive would cost, and these days the ferry usually wins for us. See the full breakdown in our guide to motorhome ferries to Europe.
Book the summer sailings early. The crossings that take a motorhome fill up well ahead of the school holidays, and the price tends to climb the closer you leave it, exactly the kind of cost you can control with a bit of planning.
Campsites, aires and free stops
Where you sleep is the biggest lever you control
Of everything in this guide, where you stay each night is the cost you have the most control over, and the range is enormous. We have paid as little as €8 a night for a beachside aire in Spain, and as much as €61 for a campsite with electric hookup and a pool. In between sit rallies, at around £10 a night, and the occasional free stop that costs nothing at all.
Aires trade facilities for price. A basic aire might give you a pitch and nothing more; a serviced one adds fresh water and waste disposal for a small fee. Campsites cost more but earn their place when you want laundry done, a proper shower, a pool for the boys, or somewhere secure to leave the van for a day. See our guide to motorhome aires for the full picture on how they work.
In the UK, motorhome rallies are consistently good value, we have paid around £10 a night at a New Forest rally through motorhomer.com, and pub stopovers can be even better: the Metal Bridge Inn near Gretna Green gave us free overnight parking plus a £10 two-course meal and a £4.50 pint, which is hard to beat by any measure.
Mix the two. Free or cheap aires and rallies for most nights, a proper campsite every few days to reset. It keeps the average cost down without making every night feel like you are roughing it.
Food and eating on the road
Cooking your own beats eating out, most nights
Food is the cost most within your control day to day, and the biggest lever is simple: shop like a local rather than eating out every night. A Spanish supermarket run turned up wine at €2.29 a bottle, a fraction of what the same evening would cost from a restaurant table, and stocking up properly at a big supermarket rather than a tourist-town corner shop makes a real difference over a two-week trip.
We do still eat out. A table grill at a campsite restaurant, or a proper meal in a town we are only passing through once, is part of the trip rather than a cost to avoid entirely. The habit that saves the most money is treating restaurants as the exception rather than the default.
Tolls and LPG
Two costs that catch first-timers out
Toll roads catch a lot of first-time tourers out, partly because motorhomes are often charged at a higher class than a car, and it is not always applied correctly by default. At a French toll booth we were quoted nearly 99 euros before asking for the correct "camping car class two" rate, which dropped the toll to 62.10 euros, a saving of almost 40 euros for pressing one button. Always check you are being charged the right class for your vehicle.
Not every country tolls the same way. Spain has a mix of free autovias and tolled autopistas, and our own drives there have largely avoided tolls by sticking to the free roads, which a slower-paced van trip gives you the time to do. See our Spain guide for more on driving there.
On gas, we can say less with confidence. Refill point coverage varies a lot across Europe, which is part of why several of our own vans have leaned towards diesel heating rather than gas: diesel is far easier to find on the road. See our diesel heater guide for why we made that switch. If you are relying on LPG, check the refill network on your planned route before you go.
Real numbers from our trips
Every figure sourced, nothing invented
Pulling every real figure from this guide into one place, so you can see the actual range for yourself rather than take our word for it.
- Fuel, Bruges
We filled up at 184.9p a litre, 75 litres for just under €140. Not the best fuel price of that trip, but far from the worst either.
- Fuel, Croatia
75 litres for £103.02, the best fuel price we found on that whole run. Fuel genuinely swings that much country to country, even within the same trip.
- AdBlue, Turkey
A Turkish forecourt filled 77 litres of diesel and topped up 10 litres of AdBlue for £11, with the staff doing the AdBlue for us, which we were glad of.
- Aire, Spanish coast
A beachside aire in Spain came to €8 a night for our eight-and-a-half-metre van. A proper pitch, no frills beyond the basics.
- Campsite, electric & pool
At the other end of the scale, one continental campsite with electric hookup and a pool came to €61 a night. Facilities cost money wherever you are.
- Rally, New Forest
A motorhomer.com rally in the New Forest was £10 a night, in line with what we generally pay for rallies: sociable, simple and consistently good value.
- Pub stopover, Gretna
The Metal Bridge Inn near Gretna Green gave us free overnight parking with a £10 two-course meal and a £4.50 pint. One of the best value nights we have had on the road.
- Toll, France
A French toll booth quoted us nearly 99 euros by default. Asking for the correct "camping car class two" rate dropped it to 62.10 euros, a saving of almost 40 euros for pressing one button.
- Car park, Porto
A barrier car park at Porto Airport, safe and central, cost €7.50 a night. Ideal for one night before a flight pickup.
If you have followed us for a while, some of these will look familiar from the videos they came from. For everything we have not yet nailed down, mainly ferry fares, a full trip fuel total, a weekly food budget and LPG costs, we would rather leave the gap visible than fill it with a made-up number. We will update this guide as we pull those together.
Motorhome cost questions we get asked
Is motorhoming cheaper than a hotel holiday?
It can be, and by a wide margin, if you are deliberate about where you stay. The clearest comparison we have is a one-off hotel stay in Kensington, London, which Steve quoted at around "250 quid a night." Aires, rallies and pub stopovers can bring a night down to a fraction of that. A serviced campsite with electric and a pool costs more, closer to a modest hotel rate, but still nothing like a city hotel bill. A motorhome gives you the choice, a hotel holiday rarely does.
How much is fuel for a European motorhome trip?
It depends heavily on where you are driving and how heavy your van is. We have paid as little as £103.02 for 75 litres in Croatia and 184.9p a litre in Belgium for the same amount of fuel, on the same kind of trip. An older, smaller van we used to run, a 3.0 litre Kon-Tiki, returned 22 to 23 miles to the gallon; our current 5.5 tonne coachbuilt drinks more. We do not yet have a clean end-to-end fuel total for a full trip to give you, and would rather say that honestly than guess. Budget generously and expect the number to move country to country.
Are aires cheaper than campsites?
Generally yes, often significantly so. We have stayed on a Spanish beach aire for €8 a night with basic services, against €61 for a campsite with electric hookup and a pool. Aires trade facilities for price: no pool, no shop, sometimes no services at all, but a fraction of the cost. Our approach is to mix the two, aires for most touring nights and a campsite every few days when we want a proper reset.
What is the biggest hidden cost of motorhome touring?
Tolls catch a lot of first-timers out, because motorhomes are often charged at a higher class than a car and it is not always applied correctly by default. We once saved almost 40 euros at a single French toll booth simply by asking for the correct "camping car class two" rate rather than accepting what the machine offered first. It is always worth asking the question rather than assuming the first price quoted is the right one.
Do I need to budget for tolls in Europe?
It depends on the country and the route. France has a proper network of tolled autoroutes, and getting your vehicle class right matters, as above. Spain has a mix of free and tolled roads, and our own drives there have often avoided tolls almost entirely by sticking to the free autovias rather than the autopistas, something a slower-paced van trip gives you the time to do. Build in a little slack for tolls, but do not assume every country charges as much as the last one.
How much should I budget for LPG or gas?
This is one we cannot give you a confirmed figure for yet, so we are not going to invent one. What we can say is that gas costs and refill point coverage vary a lot across Europe, which is part of why several of our own vans have leaned towards diesel heating rather than gas: diesel is far easier to find on the road than an LPG refill point in some parts of the continent. If you are travelling with LPG, check refill coverage on your route before you go rather than assume every country works like the UK.
Written by Steve and Lyndsay Radford. Every figure in this guide is a real number from one of our own trips, fuel receipts, toll booths, aire and campsite nights, pulled from our own footage and notes. Where we do not yet have a solid figure, mainly ferry fares, a full trip fuel total and LPG costs, we have said so rather than guess. Roaming Radfords is a trading name of Yowzer Limited.