I have just spent the last four months driving through a number of countries in Europe, and was amazed by the number of vans on the roads and not one of them over 16 foot. When in Austria I saw a large caravan park with plenty of vans so I stopped and wandered in, where there was a group of people enjoying a happy hour.

I politely asked if I could discuss something that was puzzling and I was made very welcome, I asked why there were no vans larger than 16 foot and they told me there are two main reasons 1. larger vans require the driver to have a truck licence people who travel in caravans especially in the United Kingdom couldn't negotiate the extremely narrow and windy roads with a van greater than 18 foot, I did see a number of Motor Holmes that were larger in size but again I was told you must have a truck licence.

I told them about our great Grey Nomads forum and left a number of them with the web address and the happy hour group asked me to say Gday to our members with an aussie accent so "Gday everyone".

Also noticed that nobody used torsion bars when towing no matter how small the car and the tow bar looked much less substantial than the  tow bars we are required to use here, there is no such thing as a break away braking system but most vans did have a single chain between drawbar and tow vehicle. all of my driving was in a 9 seat Fiat van as we also had other family members with us, we had a fantastic driving holiday over four months but now back and heading down the coast with my van to sleep and fish.