10225 Travel Alternatives from UK?

This old thread may help regarding route planning:

[url]http://www.italymag.co.uk/forums/travel-holiday-advice/9686-route-planning.html[/url]

We always drive, but from the north of Spain, so our experiences will not help you.
It should take you a couple of days, with an overnight en route to make it comfortable.

I remember as a teen driving direct from Heysham to Barga, Tuscany with an uncle and cousin with only stops for coffee. Took 36 hours! :eeeek:
Mind you it was a Mercedes and I had the back to myself as I didn't drive. :SLEEP::bigergrin:

Sorry, that doesn't help your enquiry. :eerr:

Alas we're in a new(ish) Mondeo with 3 kids in the back. 36 hours is a long time but we have just been to Barga for 2 hot weeks! :laughs:

Well I am arriving there on Thursday and I hope you didn't take the hot weather away with you. :bigergrin:
Can't wait! :Dancing_biggrin:

[quote=M&C;95149]This has probably been posted before, but here goes anyway. We're looking at alternatives to flying next year and taking our own car - for those of you who drive down regularly what's the best way to go? The kind of things like:

[LIST]
[*]Recommendations for cheapest/quickest ferry crossings?
[*]Best port to sail to for driving to Italy?
[*]How [B]do[/B] you book your car onto the Eurostar?
[*]How long does it take?
[*]Do you do it in one hit or 2 days?
[*]How long does it take, for example to Umbria or thereabouts? Central-ish.
[*]Any gotchas to be aware of?
[/LIST][/quote]

Recommendations for cheapest/quickest ferry crossings? - Speedferries is pretty good value

Best port to sail to for driving to Italy? - depends where you start from - Hull to Rotterdam is good for those to the north of civilisation - otherwise Dover Folkestone is the norm - but the Dunkirk service from Dover is useful

How do you book your car onto the Eurostar? - you cant - but Euro tunnel is the one you mean [I think] website is best - but can by phone

How long does it take? - Depends on Route - Eurotunnel - 45 minutes. Dover -Calais ferry - 90 minutes [time for a meal/rest]. Speedferries 45 mins or so [land a Boulogne]. Hull Rotterdam - expensive, overnight, but no further from Italy than Calais!

Do you do it in one hit or 2 days? - up to you - I prefer a leisurely drive down [2 night stops][ to Northern Italy] and 1 night stop back. Others do it in a single blast

How long does it take, for example to Umbria or thereabouts? Central-ish. - I'd suggest 2 night stops, with an early start at Dover - others will disagree

Any gotchas to be aware of? - petrol in Luxembourg and particularly Switzerland is cheapest
Swiss motorways need an annual vignette to use [£20 ish]
Swiss Tunnels into Italy are free [apart from vignette] Don't forget spare light bulbs - warning triangle and hi-vi jacket. Drive with dipped lights in Italy.

With thanks to Alan H and several others, I've planned to drive down from North East of Manchester in September.

Overnight Hull to Zeebrugge
one day Zeebrugge to Colmar (via Belgium and Luxembourg)
one day Colmar to Lago d'Iseo.

I think that these will be easy drives, and could travel further on either day.
We are actually spending two days at Colmar.

I've driven further than this through France - St Omer to Lago Maggiore in one, very tiring day, but with two drivers, but I'd rather try to treat the car journey as part of the holiday, rather than just a drive.

I will report on my return.

Hi
I would be very interested in hearing how you get on with your trip. I am just about to book ferry tickets from Hull to Zeebrugge in December over Xmas and New year, driving down to L'Aquila in Abruzzo.
If anyone has experience of this trip I would also love to hear of your experiences, places to stay/avoid, routes of choice etc etc

Ben

A link that may be useful

[url]http://www.italymag.co.uk/forums/travel-holiday-advice/5656-my-route-uk.html?[/url]

Stribs

We've recently driven to Rome (almost) and back, and it was quite an amazing journey. Not particularly difficult, but then we took 3 days each way and our kids (for the most part) are remarkably well behaved in the car (unlike most of the time). Itinerary:

Eurotunnel Thurs pm, arr Calais 16:00-(all times are 'ish'), hotel in Dijon, arr 22:30.
Left hotel 10:30, drove cross country to Switzerland (bought Vignette), around the top of Lake Geneva and up to the Great Saint Bernard, tunnel or pass (Col). I'm a bit of an Italian Job fan, so opted for the Col (despite it pouring with rain). Starts to get funny now. The road is being resurfaced and let's just say a 4x4 would have been handy! Then the rain turns to snow, it's 2.5 degrees C outside, and the snow is laying. 15th August I remind you. Thick snow on the ground at the top, beginning to wish I hadn't taken the snowchains out of the boot, and the 'view' was to just beyond the car bonnet. Still, never mind, all part of the adventure. Headed on down to Turin, trying to figure out where they loaded the minis into the back of the bus, arr 18:00.

Left hotel 11:00 Sat, got lost in Turin, convinced we saw several film locations (piazza's, steps, shopping arcades, etc...), definitely saw the weir, and eventually found the autostrade, headed on down to Genova to take the coast road through Tuscany. What a beautiful part of the world. The sun was shining, the traffic wasn't too heavy, and the scenery was breathtaking, as were the tunnels, all 36 of them apparently (more like 50). One 30 min hold up at a toll booth, but apart from that plain sailing, arr Romano Trevignano at 19:30.

2 glorious weeks later we came back using the main motorway up the middle of Italy, and it was heavy going, but then it was the busiest day of the year. We couldn't resist a last morning in the pool, so didn't get away until after 13:00 and didn't get to the hotel until 22:30! I think we'd have got stuck in traffic regardless of departure time, glad we chose the pool. Italian driving is something to behold (and I don't mean that in a good way). We'll never know if the coast road would have been quieter, was anyone here on it? Saturday 30th I think.

The other two legs back were a breeze. Over the Alps again, sunny this time, fantastic view (Italian Job CD playing :bigergrin:), delicious meal in Switzerland, back to the hotel in Dijon by 18:00 (left hotel in Turin at 11:00, and took 2 hours for lunch). Last leg from Dijon on the Monday, dep 11:00, caught the 17:00 shuttle, very easy.

Overall a rather pleasant way to do the journey, and probably cheaper than flights and car hire for 4 during the last 2 weeks in August. Would I do it again? Probably, but maybe just the 2 days each way. I was anticipating delays at the Alps that weren't there, but then maybe we were just lucky, or was it our route, longer, slower, but we had the time, which we wouldn't have if we did it in 2 days.

Already planning next year though, we fell in love with Italy...

This is an interesting thread, thank you. Re Ducatti, we drove to Lunigiana for the first time last year in October and went via Hull/Europort. We really enjoyed it and found it quite easy. The crossing was calm and next morning we had disembarked by about 8.15 and were heading off through Holland, Belgium, Switzerland etc down to France and guess where we stayed- Colmar (like everyone else)! The next morning we went vis Gotthard tunnel and were at Lake Como in time for lunch in the sun by the lake. The tunnel was fine although below freezing and snowing in Switzerland. It took us 6-7 hours driving each day at a fairly leisurely pace with stops and we are doing the same this year. Only problem we had was returning as it was just after the heavy snowfall about 20 November but that was abit of a freak thing I think (hope). We bought the vignette for Switzerland over the 'net' and it arrived in 2 days. Otherwise no problems. Good luck!

We drive to Italy every year from mid-Wales. The route this year was travel inn, Folkestone and then Eurotunnel before 6am. Down through France to Chamonix 2 night stay. Then Mont Blanc tunnel, down A7 to Genoa, La Spezia, and then on down to Siena. We've also gone over Grand St Bernard pass.
Home via Austria, Germany, a night in Belgium and midday train.
We've also driven down and stayed in Germany but find the French autoroutes easy driving. Eurotunnel excellent and only 30-35mins crossing then straight onto motorways.

Just got the Swiss Motorway pass on line from:
[url=http://www.stc.co.uk/swisstravelsystem.html]Switzerland Travel Centre.co.uk | Swiss Travel Passes[/url]
in two days for £26

My advice - check with viamichelin.com for route take 4 days for UK to Rome, 3 overnight stops, france, switzerland and nthn Italy, Express by holiday inn reliable or consult venere.com for hotels. Take it easy and you wont end up a limp rag. Motorail sadly now a shadow of its former self.

KDR1066 Enjoyed the travelogue - thanks for posting.

Mental note - must build a page about the Italian Job - with pictures of all the locations - sounds like a fun project for this winter. (Along with the other few hundred projects I seem to have lined up)......