Hail hit the campsite where we were staying. What do we need?

The date and the exact pitch, photographs of the whole vehicle and of each damaged surface, a written note from reception if the site issues one, and a meteorological confirmation for that location and day. Collect them before you leave — obtaining them afterwards from home is much harder.

I scraped the car in a Rovinj alley. Is that worth reporting?

If nobody else was involved it is a matter between you and your own comprehensive cover, and the report deadline in your policy applies. Photograph the damage and the place while you are still there; a scrape with no photographs and no location is the weakest kind of file.

Can the vehicle be inspected at the campsite?

Yes. Inspections take place where the vehicle stands, on the pitch. There is no reason to move a damaged caravan or car for an appointment, and moving it can create damage that then has to be separated from the original.

Istria: Pula, Poreč, Rovinj and Umag

Istria is the densest caravan and motorhome region on the Adriatic, and the damage that happens here reflects that: far more of it occurs while parked than while driving.

The roads: the Istrian Y and the Učka tunnel

The peninsula is served by a Y-shaped motorway — one arm running down the west coast from the Slovenian border past Poreč and Rovinj to Pula, the other crossing the interior towards the Učka tunnel and Rijeka. Traffic is heavy but the layout is simple, and the classic incidents are rear-end collisions at the toll plazas and lane-change contacts on the summer Saturdays when half of Central Europe changes shift.

The tunnel itself is long, single-bore over most of its length and slow. Damage there is usually minor contact damage, but the recovery is anything but minor: nothing can be photographed at leisure inside a tunnel, so the documentation has to be redone at the first safe stop.

The campsite coast between Umag and Medulin

The pitches from Umag through Poreč and Vrsar down to Medulin hold tens of thousands of vehicles in season. Hail is the event that fills our files here — a storm lasting a few minutes over a site with a thousand caravans produces a thousand nearly identical claims, and the insurers handling them compare notes.

That is a reason to document precisely rather than quickly. The date, the exact pitch, a meteorological confirmation for the location, and a photographic protocol that shows the distribution of the impacts across the horizontal surfaces are what distinguish a well-founded claim from one that arrives in a batch and is treated as one of many.

Old towns and the walls that do not move

Rovinj, Poreč and the hill towns behind them were laid out before cars existed, and the streets prove it. Wing mirrors, bumper corners, wheel rims and caravan flanks are the usual casualties, and the other party is almost always a wall.

Where there is no other party there is also no witness, which is why photographs taken on the spot matter more here than anywhere else. Where another vehicle was involved and has gone, report it to the police — a claim for damage caused by an unidentified vehicle runs through a separate route that starts with that report.

Getting the damage recorded

Inspections in Istria are straightforward: the region is compact, the campsites are used to appraisers, and the vehicle does not have to be moved. Start by sending photographs over WhatsApp; the preliminary assessment is free and normally comes back the same day, with a clear answer on whether the vehicle is fit to drive home.

MOTOEXPERT documents and values damage. We do not settle claims on your behalf and we do not give legal advice; where a lawyer is needed we recommend a specialist in traffic law.

Frequently asked questions

Hail hit the campsite where we were staying. What do we need?: The date and the exact pitch, photographs of the whole vehicle and of each damaged surface, a written note from reception if the site issues one, and a meteorological confirmation for that location and day. Collect them before you leave — obtaining them afterwards from home is much harder.
I scraped the car in a Rovinj alley. Is that worth reporting?: If nobody else was involved it is a matter between you and your own comprehensive cover, and the report deadline in your policy applies. Photograph the damage and the place while you are still there; a scrape with no photographs and no location is the weakest kind of file.
Can the vehicle be inspected at the campsite?: Yes. Inspections take place where the vehicle stands, on the pitch. There is no reason to move a damaged caravan or car for an appointment, and moving it can create damage that then has to be separated from the original.