Car hire south of France.
Discussion
Just wondered if anyone had any recommendations for car hire companies in either Nice, Frejus or St Raphael areas?
I ask as we are coming down for a fortnight in June and while we usually come down in a nice car we are bringing Sarahs 81Yr old Grandma with us, French Algerian by birth but moved to the UK when the war of independence occurred, fantastically interesting lady who escaped a country where her family were extremely wealthy and left with little more than the clothes on their backs. She hasn't been out of the country since and would love to go to France.
Needless to say we can't really cram her in one of our cars and the most practical car we have at the moment is a 3 series coupe to put the pair of us, Sarahs Mum and Grandma in plus luggage for a 1400 Mile journey doesn't bode well. Infact I don't think she could take it to be honest.
So I'm stuck in the awkward position of either the 4 of us go down on the train (surprisingly cheap, cheaper infact than flying and more civilised albeit about 2 hours slower) and then hiring an overpriced bland car down there, or Sarahs Mum and Grandma going on the train and we drive down in the BMW and meet them at the South end railway station and go off to our accommodation around 15 miles away. I much prefer the latter option, it's not far off the same price, I get to enjoy the drive down and get a decent car to drive while down there, plus we can bring back whatever we want to without having to cram it all in a suitcase.
Basically I hate public transport even when it is efficient.
Just as a last try and because I got a look of death when I suggested my wholy sensible idea of they go down on train and I/We drive down are there any car hire companies ideally small ones, who hire out cars cheaply because they aren't the latest models or reasonably priced nice cars to hire?
I can't think of anything to be honest and I've spent a good portion of my life out in the Cavalaire-St.Tropez area I think I'm going to end up stuck on a train and then suffering 2 weeks in a Fiat Panda
I ask as we are coming down for a fortnight in June and while we usually come down in a nice car we are bringing Sarahs 81Yr old Grandma with us, French Algerian by birth but moved to the UK when the war of independence occurred, fantastically interesting lady who escaped a country where her family were extremely wealthy and left with little more than the clothes on their backs. She hasn't been out of the country since and would love to go to France.
Needless to say we can't really cram her in one of our cars and the most practical car we have at the moment is a 3 series coupe to put the pair of us, Sarahs Mum and Grandma in plus luggage for a 1400 Mile journey doesn't bode well. Infact I don't think she could take it to be honest.
So I'm stuck in the awkward position of either the 4 of us go down on the train (surprisingly cheap, cheaper infact than flying and more civilised albeit about 2 hours slower) and then hiring an overpriced bland car down there, or Sarahs Mum and Grandma going on the train and we drive down in the BMW and meet them at the South end railway station and go off to our accommodation around 15 miles away. I much prefer the latter option, it's not far off the same price, I get to enjoy the drive down and get a decent car to drive while down there, plus we can bring back whatever we want to without having to cram it all in a suitcase.
Basically I hate public transport even when it is efficient.
Just as a last try and because I got a look of death when I suggested my wholy sensible idea of they go down on train and I/We drive down are there any car hire companies ideally small ones, who hire out cars cheaply because they aren't the latest models or reasonably priced nice cars to hire?
I can't think of anything to be honest and I've spent a good portion of my life out in the Cavalaire-St.Tropez area I think I'm going to end up stuck on a train and then suffering 2 weeks in a Fiat Panda
I'm a regular commuter on the train and I hate it, so I can see where your coming from. It may however be a good option so don't just through it aside.
A company I used previously and found that their rates are really good was Indigo Car Hire, they've got a handy quote engine thingy on their site http://indigocarhire.co.uk/ and they are nice to deal with on the phone in general. Decent reviews too of what I've seen so I would recommend them.
Car hire like you mentioned however will probably work out slightly more expensive than the train but again you get more freedom etc.
A company I used previously and found that their rates are really good was Indigo Car Hire, they've got a handy quote engine thingy on their site http://indigocarhire.co.uk/ and they are nice to deal with on the phone in general. Decent reviews too of what I've seen so I would recommend them.
Car hire like you mentioned however will probably work out slightly more expensive than the train but again you get more freedom etc.
Bizarrely if you're stuck with renting and are trying to get the lowest price then the large companies often offer cheaper prices depending on whether you book through their UK or French websites. I now live in France and when renting here almost always find its cheaper to book through the big companies .co.uk sites, whereas renting in the UK I find that the .fr sites usually give you a cheaper deal. The difference has been up to 30% for identical reservations.
trunnie said:
Bizarrely if you're stuck with renting and are trying to get the lowest price then the large companies often offer cheaper prices depending on whether you book through their UK or French websites. I now live in France and when renting here almost always find its cheaper to book through the big companies .co.uk sites, whereas renting in the UK I find that the .fr sites usually give you a cheaper deal. The difference has been up to 30% for identical reservations.
How true! It's astonishing but being also able to rent from two countries, I realised that the swiss websites of large companies were always cheaper than the local ones, AND included a CDW that was always an option on local websites. Works in US, Canada, UK, France...Alternatively, it's damn expensive to rent a car in Switzerland. That is, unless you book it from abroad!
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