Trip to France
 

Peeps, need some advice from you lovely folks. Myself and 3 other mates we are trying to arrange a weekend drive to France Monaco. Any suggestions as to routes stop over etc. We are sharing the drive hopefully so should make it less tiring. any reasonable hotels etc on route? cheers guys

I can't really help with Hotels, they seem to have cheap basic places like Formula 1 etc or proper Hotels in Town centres that are quite expensive. Very little in berween. I'm sure others may have better advice on Hotels.

I'd recommend getting a Toll Tag from www.ATMB.com if using the Autoroutes, it can save a lot of time at the Toll Booths. You set up an Account and pay a refundable deposit on the Tag and a small monthly fee + Toll charges. Return the tag by post and cancel your account when you get back.

Campanile Hotels are pretty reasonable and similar to Premier Inns - they have over 300 in France - link > https://www.campanile.com/en/france

Stayed here before, enroute to the south.
http://www.novotel.com/gb/hotel-0428...ux/index.shtml

Functional. Loads of safe parking. Reasonable price. Good bar/restaurant. Outdoor pool.
Most importantly, 5 mins from the old race circuit!

Might not be far enough south for the first stop for you though.

cheers guys will look at these.+++

Done this a few times, I'd recommend going across to Reims and seeing the old GP circuit, going onto Colmar for a stop over at a really nice campsite there (tents already supplied and fully kitted out, I can fish out the details if you want).

Then head to Mulhouse to see the Sclumpf collection at the car museum, dive into Switzerland after that and head over the mountains into northern Italy (you'll need to get a tax sticker at the border and hide your dashcam) - the views are amazing on this route.

Once in Italy you head down to Menaggio (lovely place to stay and best book a place with parking available at the hotel as its small and tight there.

Final part of the route is to head on the motorway past Monza then onto Italian back roads and tunnels for a stop off in San Remo for some lunch and then into Monaco.

We spent the time at the front enjoying stuff then blasted back on the motorways via Lyon and Lemans stopping overnight about half way before heading to a cash and carry in Calais for wine stocking.

There is also a good book for motorists exploring France currently on sale in the works bookstores for £3 that I recommend.

You've chosen a great trip, just remember your Euro driving pack and enough disposable breathalysers for all passengers as well as watching your speed as they chase for fines aggressively

Edit - realised you said weekend... long weekend maybe? Lol

This is the book

And this is the campsite - Colmar is gorgeous!

http://campingdelill.fr/?utm_medium=...FrancevoyageFR

Thanks mate very useful!!! Yeah we are going friday and returning Sunday late eve so there some time restrictions.+++

We use Ibis budget, they're utilitarian and reasonably priced. Me and the boy like them, his mother not so much. To be fair there isn't much she does like. Can book them online/through Accor app.

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That looks like it could have been written by me....seems a common issue;)

Got back last week from doing a banger rally on these exact routes. Drove down from Essex and stayed in the Formula 1 hotel near Reims ready for the off the next morning. There's a few other hotels around there including a decent budget one next door but you know what you're getting with the cheap and cheerful F1 so I don't mind them too much. Start point for the rally (with 20 other cars) was the straight on the old Reims track. Be sure to explore behind the pit area and you can even climb up in the old viewing/race control tower.

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From Reims we cruised down to Interlaken, Switzerland (always avoiding toll roads/motorways). Unfortunately there aren't many breathtaking roads on this route to make the long drive more exciting. Enjoyed a few beers at Hooters, Interlaken (we liked to enjoy the local food and people) with the white cap of Mont Blanc rising high above the other mountains and seeing another rally made up entirely of mk1 Skylines driving from Abu Dhabi.

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(Yes, it's the Smokey And The Bandit Trans Am :D )

Day 2 onwards is where the scenery started getting tasty. We drove from Interlaken to Bormio, Italy.

Day 3 the route was from Bormio dipping back into France to Val d'Isere taking in lots of Switzerland and northern Italy including the Stelvio Pass, St Bernard passes, Contra dam (from Goldeneye), Lake Como, Lake Menaggio and the Aosta valley. If the weather is decent the mountain passes will be flooded with bikers and motorhomes. It's easy for Top Gear to hoon it around these roads when they have them closed but you just can't be that brave when you don't know if there's a Dutch motorhome around the corner and have a 500ft straight drop with no barrier to your offside so you have to settle down and be sensible sometimes. There are fearsome switchbacks on some of these mountain passes. Last year we did the route in an old Jag XJ Sport and were reversing on some of the tight switchbacks to get round them, not making for an elegant sight. If in the vicinity you can even take an excursion to Mont Blanc to cross the French/Italian border but there is a toll of €43.50/€54.30 one-way/return respectively so be prepared for that if you are doing the tunnel!

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The nav looked like this most of the time:
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Day 4 we left Val d'Isere for Monaco and Nice skirting Turin, driving through the ski town of Isola 2000 and heading south to the Col de Turini. Did the obligatory lap or two of the Monaco circuit (the police take a dim view of any speeding here) then drove the coast road to Nice and settled in the port for Bastille day evening so everywhere was lively.

Day 5 everyone dispersed and our journey home was a non-stop slog from Nice to Calais, the fastest route possible. Raced to catch our 9pm train only to find out there were massive delays and we eventually left Calais on the next train which happened to be the last train at 1:55am. :mad:


As said, if using Swiss motorways you will need a vignette sticker which can be bought at the the motorway checkpoints for €40 iirc or you can buy online before for €32. In Switzerland you can pay for anything in Euros and you'll get Swiss Francs back in change at an unfavorable rate but it does save juggling Sterling, Euros and Swiss Francs around in your pockets and wallet all the time.

Swiss police don't mess about either. A member of another team dodged an 80CHF fine for speeding 3 years ago and thought it would go away. Unsurprisingly the car's number plate flagged up at a motorway checkpoint in Switzerland this time and they wouldn't allow him to leave until he paid 1,550CHF! Needless to say he wasn't very cheerful for the rest of the rally.

I fancy going back and doing the same routes in my S8, I think it would be surprisingly confident on the mountain passes, but it's a whole day of solid driving to get down to the good stuff. An alternative is to fly to Milan (flights sometimes come up for £40 return!) and rent a tasty car from Avis Prestige or similar for the trip. You can rent an Abarth for the week for just €120 or even an Alfa 4C for €300. Some of the fast mountain roads can really punish cars and destroy brakes so it's much easier doing that in a rental car or if you are lucky enough to have ceramic brakes! One team had an automatic Micra and obviously didn't know about engine braking, by the bottom of one of the mountain roads the alloys had MELTED to the centre hub where the guy was on the brakes non stop. Another team had a big old Lexus LS and the paint on the alloys was visibly bubbling at the bottom of the same road.

You aren't a million miles away from southwest Germany there so that shouldn't be ruled out either. The Black Forest and Triberg have some decent roads that not many people know about.

Sounds like you did the same as some of my trips, mine were part of the Crumball rally, then doing my own variants after with the wife and friends.

I found Switzerland beautiful, but we diverted off route and over the mountains as the motorways were shut because of a huge shunt, some mountain passes were still shut because of snow - and this was in May!

I'll nick some of your stop off points for variation next time +++

Yeah, we did the same rally this year as last year so we could afford to go 'off-piste' a little and explore after discovering what is worth driving and what not to bother with again.

Beautiful part of the world though. Switzerland has some amazing scenery and stopping for lunch around Lake Como in Italy was most agreeable.

Wow
 

Just brilliant!!!+++

Oh Dear, the memories.
I've travelled those areas many times with the coaches. I used to dodge the tunnels and go over the top to give the tourists a decent view/experience. Couldn't do it in the winter though. One August while the passengers were having breakfast I was scraping snow off the coach windscreen.
You are correct that some of the hairpins are tight But then I have taken a coach up Vesuvious and negotiated all the bends without reversing, though the first time was a bit frought, IIRC two of them caught me out. Soon learnt the best approach.
On one of our Yugoslavia tours I used to do an overnight at Lake Como and on the return at Lake Maggioro. We had to stop them when the silly buggers started shooting at the coaches.

Resurrecting an old thread, but I drove from Geneva to Calais to get the Eurotunnel back home to Essex on Sunday and made a 5 minute detour off the long dreary A26 motorway to go via the old race circuit at Reims and stretch my legs and refuel the Polo. I can report that it's all still standing and is still serving as a pilgrimage site for car rallies and motorsport fans +++

It's always worth going to if you are heading down to the south and it's 3 hours from Calais.

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Nice! I think that will be my next on list if we don’t have a hard Brexit