The big drive. Advice please.
Discussion
Well, I'm driving to Italy on Friday and I really can't wait. I have sat nav (NavMan 550) but it tends to crash allot so I'm going to go old school and use auto route express as a back up.
The route looks crazzeeee.... I have opted to take the 'no toll' route, which has come out rather interesting and has approximate journey time of 24 hours (cough cough)
Via the Channel tunnel to France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria and finally Italy. In my mind the more countries the better and it looks like a far more interesting route than option B (with Toll) : France, Switzerland, Italy. This has an approx time of 16 hours but will obviously be motorway and heavy toll charges, alright if your in RS6 I suppose but the Tiv surely wants more of the A roads.
Does anyone have experience of border crossing times? I don't want to get stuck for an hour at each border. Do any of the countries pose a problem for me? road conditions? any major points of interest / must see places? How long do you think it will realistically take?
Thanks
J
The route looks crazzeeee.... I have opted to take the 'no toll' route, which has come out rather interesting and has approximate journey time of 24 hours (cough cough)
Via the Channel tunnel to France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria and finally Italy. In my mind the more countries the better and it looks like a far more interesting route than option B (with Toll) : France, Switzerland, Italy. This has an approx time of 16 hours but will obviously be motorway and heavy toll charges, alright if your in RS6 I suppose but the Tiv surely wants more of the A roads.
Does anyone have experience of border crossing times? I don't want to get stuck for an hour at each border. Do any of the countries pose a problem for me? road conditions? any major points of interest / must see places? How long do you think it will realistically take?
Thanks
J
Hi J
What borders? Normaly you just drive thru cause there are no contols anymore except for Switzerland. But if there are any of the big tunnels on your route you might have to prepare yourself for a little wait when you drive on the weekends.
Gorgeous car btw. Looks like you´ll have loads of fun. Enjoy!
Cheers Jens
What borders? Normaly you just drive thru cause there are no contols anymore except for Switzerland. But if there are any of the big tunnels on your route you might have to prepare yourself for a little wait when you drive on the weekends.
Gorgeous car btw. Looks like you´ll have loads of fun. Enjoy!
Cheers Jens
aerospoke said:
Hi J
What borders? Normaly you just drive thru cause there are no contols anymore except for Switzerland. But if there are any of the big tunnels on your route you might have to prepare yourself for a little wait when you drive on the weekends.
Gorgeous car btw. Looks like you´ll have loads of fun. Enjoy!
Cheers Jens
What borders? Normaly you just drive thru cause there are no contols anymore except for Switzerland. But if there are any of the big tunnels on your route you might have to prepare yourself for a little wait when you drive on the weekends.
Gorgeous car btw. Looks like you´ll have loads of fun. Enjoy!
Cheers Jens
EU - of course, what about the Swiss? my Tiv is VERY - loud. im wondering if there even going to let me in :-)
Think I might go that route on the way back and take the toll free route on the way there. Im sure ive heard of car-jacking in Lux, or am I very wrong ?
honahont350 said:
aerospoke said:
Hi J
What borders? Normaly you just drive thru cause there are no contols anymore except for Switzerland. But if there are any of the big tunnels on your route you might have to prepare yourself for a little wait when you drive on the weekends.
Gorgeous car btw. Looks like you´ll have loads of fun. Enjoy!
Cheers Jens
What borders? Normaly you just drive thru cause there are no contols anymore except for Switzerland. But if there are any of the big tunnels on your route you might have to prepare yourself for a little wait when you drive on the weekends.
Gorgeous car btw. Looks like you´ll have loads of fun. Enjoy!
Cheers Jens
EU - of course, what about the Swiss? my Tiv is VERY - loud. im wondering if there even going to let me in :-)
Think I might go that route on the way back and take the toll free route on the way there. Im sure ive heard of car-jacking in Lux, or am I very wrong ?
I did the Furball5000 a few weeks ago and that took in France, Monaco, Italy and Switzerland. I also used a Navman 550 which performed faultlessly and picked up even the most minor roads.
From France to Monaco to Italy we encountered no borders and just drove straight through. From Italy to Switzerland we went across the border at the top of Stelvio, no problems, they did stop a couple of our cars but I think that was more to do with the fact we were travelling as a stickered up group than anything else. My Chim is also very loud and I had no problems tehre at all, got loads of waves and cheers through the villages. Going from Switzerland back to France we also had no problems, just waved straight through with a cursory glance at our passports.
I did almost exactly your non-toll route in may. I didn't go through Lux, at least if I did, I blinked and missed it 
Initially planned to maximise time in Italy by getting the German motorail overnight from Dusseldorf. Left middle of London about 9.30am, got to Dusseldorf (via Belgium & Holland) at about 6.30pm after a little too long at lunch and several serious autobahn traffic jams and getting lost in D'dorf. Unfortunately the train had left at 6. So after 90 mins or so drinking coffee, planing a route on an envelope and getting cash and fuel, we set off south and stopped for the night at 10pm at some hole of a town called Ludwigshafen (obv. would have stayed somewhere else if I'd planned to drive). Set off 11am next morning, into Austria (very pretty), over the Fernpass, lunch at Spar at some village called Obsteig, past Innsbruck and down into Italy via the Brenner pass IIRC, getting to Malcesine on Lake Garda at 7.30pm. So what's that - 10 hrs day one, 9.5 hrs day two including most stops and including driving around lost in Dusseldorf. Although that wasn't the quickest route I'm sure, going via Dusseldorf.
There were no tolls until Italy, and no border controls and no queues. So in essence:
Non-toll route: No tolls, no french revenue SORRY speed police, no speed limit in Germany (in theory - see traffic jams above), no need to buy a swiss vignette, no queuing to cross borders, nice scenery and no long tunnels.
toll route: more expensive, less fun as far as I can make out. And I've heard of horrendous queues at the Mont Blanc tunnel if you go that way. If you use a swiss motorway you need to buy a "vignette", which are cheaper IIRC to buy here in advance.
On the way back we did manage to find the train station in Livorno (Tuscany), spent the evening watching the beaches fly past from the restaurant carriage, woke up in Frankfurt. Eurotunnel was 4hr 45mins driving time from Fft (plus stops)
Initially planned to maximise time in Italy by getting the German motorail overnight from Dusseldorf. Left middle of London about 9.30am, got to Dusseldorf (via Belgium & Holland) at about 6.30pm after a little too long at lunch and several serious autobahn traffic jams and getting lost in D'dorf. Unfortunately the train had left at 6. So after 90 mins or so drinking coffee, planing a route on an envelope and getting cash and fuel, we set off south and stopped for the night at 10pm at some hole of a town called Ludwigshafen (obv. would have stayed somewhere else if I'd planned to drive). Set off 11am next morning, into Austria (very pretty), over the Fernpass, lunch at Spar at some village called Obsteig, past Innsbruck and down into Italy via the Brenner pass IIRC, getting to Malcesine on Lake Garda at 7.30pm. So what's that - 10 hrs day one, 9.5 hrs day two including most stops and including driving around lost in Dusseldorf. Although that wasn't the quickest route I'm sure, going via Dusseldorf.
There were no tolls until Italy, and no border controls and no queues. So in essence:
Non-toll route: No tolls, no french revenue SORRY speed police, no speed limit in Germany (in theory - see traffic jams above), no need to buy a swiss vignette, no queuing to cross borders, nice scenery and no long tunnels.
toll route: more expensive, less fun as far as I can make out. And I've heard of horrendous queues at the Mont Blanc tunnel if you go that way. If you use a swiss motorway you need to buy a "vignette", which are cheaper IIRC to buy here in advance.
On the way back we did manage to find the train station in Livorno (Tuscany), spent the evening watching the beaches fly past from the restaurant carriage, woke up in Frankfurt. Eurotunnel was 4hr 45mins driving time from Fft (plus stops)
munky said:
toll route: more expensive, less fun as far as I can make out. And I've heard of horrendous queues at the Mont Blanc tunnel if you go that way. If you use a swiss motorway you need to buy a "vignette", which are cheaper IIRC to buy here in advance.
Some of our guys were pulled on the Swiss M-ways for one reason or another and when noted there they had no vigenette were fined on the spot €12 or round about IIRC. As part of the fine they were also given a vignette (it's just a small sticker you put on the screen) and it actually worked out cheaper to be stopped, fined and given a vignette than to buy one beforehand.
zippee said:
munky said:
toll route: more expensive, less fun as far as I can make out. And I've heard of horrendous queues at the Mont Blanc tunnel if you go that way. If you use a swiss motorway you need to buy a "vignette", which are cheaper IIRC to buy here in advance.
Some of our guys were pulled on the Swiss M-ways for one reason or another and when noted there they had no vigenette were fined on the spot €12 or round about IIRC. As part of the fine they were also given a vignette (it's just a small sticker you put on the screen) and it actually worked out cheaper to be stopped, fined and given a vignette than to buy one beforehand.
I hear that the swiss are pretty ruthless when it comes to speeding, not that I intend to....
I did France, Switzerland, Italy last month. But the return journey missed out Switzerland.
The return journey was much better.
On the way there, the one hour queue to get from France to Switzerland was bad, the road works that kept us for over an hour in the town over the border were annoying, and the less said about the three hour wait to get in to "mount Blanc" whatever it's called (17KM tunnel) the better.
Coming through the tunnel, I clocked the queue going the opposite way as 1 1/2 miles, but the swizz to Italy queue was terrible.
Great time in Italy though, Milan & San Remo.
Make sure you take some oil
Enjoy
The return journey was much better.
On the way there, the one hour queue to get from France to Switzerland was bad, the road works that kept us for over an hour in the town over the border were annoying, and the less said about the three hour wait to get in to "mount Blanc" whatever it's called (17KM tunnel) the better.
Coming through the tunnel, I clocked the queue going the opposite way as 1 1/2 miles, but the swizz to Italy queue was terrible.
Great time in Italy though, Milan & San Remo.
Make sure you take some oil
Enjoy
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