An Eventful Second Month in Belgium (And Our June 2026 Expenses)

While May had a handful of quiet days, in June we could barely breathe – literally and figuratively.

This was our second month staying in the little house of my parents, in Berlare, Belgium. I mentioned in a previous post that we had to consider Plan B as June approached, and that’s what we did. Not finding – or better, not buying and owning – a 4×4 Vario, the vehicle we’d been pursuing for a long while, put us in a bind. We needed to be mobile again. And when a prospective Vario deal fell through (more about that soon), it was time to take action.

So, the main priority (other than continuing our search for our “forever camper”) was to… buy, register, insure, equip, and load another camper. I wrote about that process here. Duke was to become our temporary home.

It took about a week to search online for the right vehicle – potential cars, campers in Germany, vans in Belgium – before we settled on the Fiat Ducato Bürstner. During that busy first weekend of June, Mark, Maya, and I also used my mom’s car to check out another Vario chassis truck in the middle of Germany.

It went something like this: get up at 6am, split six hours of driving between the two of us, scrutinize a rust bucket for an hour, declare it a lost cause, turn around, drive the six hours back to Berlare, and be home in time for bed. All while dealing with an anxious dog in the back, who doesn’t like car rides anymore. Yeah… The amount of time, energy, and money invested in this search has been adding up.

(As always, hover over or click on photos in galleries to read their captions.)

Week two contained a lot of research and figuring out logistics related to RVing in Europe and owning a European campervan. The international propane filling situation is a headache in itself; every country has different bottles, adapters, and/or rules!

The best thing to come out of our efforts to plan the next chapter of our lives that week was a friendly neighbor allowing us to park our future camper on his empty plot next to the little house. Really great news! And there was an ironic twist, which caused us extra stress, but that’s for later as well. The weather was cold and rainy, and once, I got soaked while biking home from my parents.

Of course, we had to stay on top of some chores as well.

June’s third week was taken up by all the administrative tasks and logistics of picking up the camper’s paperwork after its second-hand inspection, dealing with the insurance, registration, and license plates, picking up our new home on wheels, making some changes, and taking it to a weighing inspection.

Mark put in a better battery and converted a few more things to make living in the Bürstner (which we called Duke) a bit easier without staying in expensive campgrounds. We would use most of this gear in our future Vario. More online shopping to equip the van also had to happen, since we left most of our belongings in Thirsty Bella, which we sold in Chile. We had to start from scratch.

By then, the heatwave had arrived. It would last ten days and made equipping, cleaning, and organizing our new camper harder and sweatier than it should have been. We had to limit those tasks to the early hours of the day because, even at night, the temperature didn’t drop much.

One night, a massive storm brought hurricane-force winds, hail, and rain, which damaged properties and trees. No Belgian around us had ever experienced something like this before. (Mark and I sat through a couple of hurricanes before.) The last part of June brought sleepless nights.

We tried to cool off a bit in the little house by rigging up a portable air conditioning unit from my parents in the living room (the hose had been tossed). It did help, but only when you sat right in front of it. The temperature inside still read 30°C (86°F).

At some point, we moved our mattress into this room to try and sleep better. But then the blinking light of the smoke alarm on the ceiling in the kitchen had Maya up and about all night. She thought it was lightning!

Luckily, we still managed to make our daily dog walks in nature until it got too hot and muggy for that as well.

And throughout June, we saw a few friends and family members – these were the fun and enjoyable moments.

By June 27th, Duke was loaded and organized, and the little house cleaned and mostly emptied. Our maiden camping trip would last about a month. And while Mark and I are experienced campers and overlanders after twenty years, we felt like rookies in a European camper on a new continent…

That being said, we had a fantastic weekend in Schoonhoven, the Netherlands, meeting up with our good American friends Heather and Jon and finally with Ivan from Spain again. We all met on the Baja Peninsula of Mexico in 2021.

While Saturday was still extremely hot – we could turn our AC on at the campground – Sunday and Monday were more pleasant. On those days we could go for walks again and sit outside to socialize.

Mark, Maya, and I concluded the month of June at a free camping spot in Simonshaven, South Holland. It was a peaceful two days before another hectic chapter would begin. Stay tuned!

Expenses for June 2026

I’m almost embarrassed to post our numbers for June. It was an extremely expensive month, but based on our circumstances and plans, it is easy to see why. We bought a new camper that needed “everything”, and Mark booked his annual flight to the US.

The highest category was household supplies at $748, which covered an array of tools, two comfortable camping chairs, bedding, and kitchen gear. Mark’s $630 flight was almost twice as expensive as in other years (blame the guy who started a war in the Middle East). We tried to soften the blow by applying for a new Chase Visa card that offered a $400 discount on the ticket, but were rejected.

Our car expenses were high as well, at $574. Most of that went to fuel for my mom’s car and for Duke. A $100 chunk was paid for the registration of the camper (inspection and plates). Groceries cost more than average, although over $400 a month seems to have become our new European average. And the liability insurance policy for our campervan was $333.

We spent a bit of money on gifts ($228) for family, friends, and our kind neighbor and on Maya ($177). Her first food order went wrong, so we had to buy an extra bag and she is soon due for more heartworm medicine. We always order a year’s supply of those tablets.

The alcohol amount was higher than in other months ($105) because we shared nice wines with friends on visits and meet-ups. The $95 annual bank charge for our Visa card was due and we spent $49 on two nights of camping with our friends in the Netherlands.

I needed to invest in new shoes. This was a bummer. I bought virtually new Keen walking shoes on eBay in January and was initially quite happy with them. Unfortunately, after a month they started falling apart and – even worse – I recently developed two different foot injuries. We suspect they were counterfeit Keens. The nearly new pair I ordered for $46 is of the Oboz brand, which Mark swears by. He will bring them back from the US in August.

We treated friends to an unhealthy Belgian dinner to thank them for the feast of a brunch they provided that day (our $31 “dining out” charge for June), and we went out to a café twice to meet up with friends in the afternoon (the $22 drinking out category). We are such party people! 🙂

The other two expenses for the month were $13 for the Park4Night app (the substitute for iOverlander in the Americas, which is rarely used in Europe and quite outdated) and $8 for a Portuguese SIM card that allowed us to access the internet. No laundry costs as I didn’t have coins for one of the dryer sessions at my parents’, and the other times, the sun did that job.

Here is a breakdown:

• Household (tools, camping chairs, mattress cover, kitchen supplies): $748
• Travel (flights Mark): $630
• Car (fuel: $474; registration camper: $100): $574
• Groceries: $411
• Camper (insurance): $333
• Gifts (birthday, Father’s Day, gifts for neighbor & family): $228
• Dog (food: $123; meds $54): $177
• Alcohol: $105
• Bank charge (annual CC fee): $95
• Camping: $49
• Clothing (shoes for Liesbet): $46
• Dining out (fries’ shop): $31
• Drinking out: $22
• Computer (Park4Night app): $13
• Utilities (internet): $8

TOTAL: $3,470

This post is linked to Natalie the Explorer’s Monthly blog link-up for June 2026.

Next up: The stressful story of the Dutch Vario

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