French autoroutes and service areas on Christmas day

[Lensey]

Hi Guys,

We are going to be driving through France on Christmas day and I'm presuming the autoroutes are open as usual but are all the garages open or will there be a limited number or any open for the festive day?

[leyorkie]

Motorway services will be open but don't expect anything else, it is worse than a Sunday. There is no Boxing day holiday service as usual but as the 25th is Friday some will bridge and take the weekend.
On the plus side traffic will be non-existant.

[Lensey]

Thats cool, just as long as we can get diesel thats all we need.

[flanders]

drove this year from belgium towards south of spain on the 1 st of january... 1st january thru france till Dax, found on the internet the locations of the petrol stations along french highways.. but in Spain on the 2 nd January it was very tricky to find petrol on time... only 35 lts reservoir in our Europa , so that was a max of 360 kms before refilling was due...

[Puggit]

Boxing Day in France is a normal day - although they might decide to stretch the holiday across the weekend.

Don't forget the French embraced pay-at-the-pump quicker than we did, so you're certain to be able to fill up at supermarkets using cards.

[Lensey]

I should be crossing into Spain on Boxing day but hopefully will have enough diesel to get to the Costa Blanca.

[leyorkie]

Puggit said
[Don't forget the French embraced pay-at-the-pump quicker than we did, so you're certain to be able to fill up at supermarkets using cards.
[/quote]

Do not depend on paying by UK cards for supermarket fuel, very few accept UK cards. You will end up waiting for a local, and buying fuel off them by using their card and giving them cash.
Motorway services will be manned and accept UK cards.

Edited by leyorkie on Tuesday 29th September 08:58

[Lensey]

Yes, I've had the problem with the pay at the pump before, I will be on the autoroute all the way so as long as the services are manned I will be using them

[blueST]

I think the pay at pump issue is no longer a problem. During my travels all over Brittany, Normandy and down to La Rochelle this summer I used pay at pump the whole time in just about every supermarket. Leclerc, Intermarche, Super U etc. That was using a Lloyds TSB Mastercard.

[Puggit]

blueST said:

I think the pay at pump issue is no longer a problem. During my travels all over Brittany, Normandy and down to La Rochelle this summer I used pay at pump the whole time in just about every supermarket. Leclerc, Intermarche, Super U etc. That was using a Lloyds TSB Mastercard.

Correct - the problem is no more.