Hi
I thought I would report back on a recent trip I did to France in late October with the view of helping other boardies looking to a “road trip”
I drive a MS 2017 90D with enhanced autopilot, CCS upgrade, MCU 2, premium connectivity and free supercharging.
I tend to drive at the speed limit (+/- 5% ) on A and B roads, Motorway I tend to drive at the limit sometimes + 5/10%
Day 1
Arrived in Cherbourg (19:00 hrs), 3 hrs late as the ferry had technical problems leaving Rosslare, and then sat in the car for 45 mins on the top outside deck as somebody on the lower deck hadnt returned to their car and the ramp between floors couldn't be lowered. Eventually left the port gates at 20:15 hrs. Luckily wasnt driving a yellow reg as they all seemed to be getting pulled.
At this point I was approx 4 hrs behind schedule and had a 9 hour drive ahead of me with a ETA of approx 05:00hrs. The forecast for the night was for high winds ( 50+ km/h) and rain – lots. I wasn't looking forward to it,
The route was Cherbourg – Caen (SuC) – Le Mans(SuC) – Poitiers(SuC) – Niort(SuC) – Saintes(SuC) – Bordeaux
At least I wouldn't have to get out of the car in the rain and pay the peage as I had got a bip n go tag – wrong the tag didn't work. It started working the following day, I suspect somebody had to press a button somewhere to activate it. Arrived in Bordeaux at 05:15
Day 2
Todays route was
Bordeaux – Carcassone Airport – Narbonne
4 h 30 min 400km
On the road by 08:30 full of caffeine No problems lovely sunny day and the toll tag worked a treat, picked up my passengers at Carcassone Airport told them I was running 2 hrs late because of the ferry delay. Arrived in Narbone and spent the rest of the day relaxing charged in Langon, Toulouse and Narbonne.
Day 3
Narbonne – Perpignan
40 mins 65 km
No problems Toll tag worked and plenty of electrons on board.
Parked the car up and left it alone for 2.5 days
Day 6
Perpignan (Suc) - Carcassone Airport – Narbonne (SuC) – Aix-en-Provence (SuC) - Aire de Vidauban (SuC) - Nice
7 hrs 600 km
A nice run meet 2 other MS ( Red and White ) on the A8 motorway and travelled in convoy for approx 50 km, that was fun. Arrived at the hotel which had a destination charger, the concierge offered to park the car put hadn't driven a Tesla and was a bit wary, so I told him to jump in the passenger seat and showed him controls and drove into the car park. The three chargers where all in use ,a Zoe BMW Hybrid and a M3.I wasnt panicking because I still had approx 20% left, , he said he would find out whose cars they where and would get them moved and would let me know when he had done so, 1 hour later got a phone call saying a space was free and plugged it in for the night. The zoe had been moved, if it had been my decision I would have got the hybrid to move.
Day 7
A quite day with approx only 100 km covered, Got back to the car park BMW and M3 still plugged in looked like they hadn't moved all day.
Day 8
Todays Route was
Nice – Aix-en-Provence (SuC) – Orange (SuC) – Vienne (SuC) - Aire du Poulet de Bresse(SuC)
7 hrs 630 km
A nice comfortable day left at about 10:30 missed the rush hour traffic and arrived at 18:00 hrs ish
One criticism is that some of the French drivers are very aggressive in pulling up very close behind you and will nip into the smallest of gaps you leave in front of you.
Day 9
Aire du Poulet de Bresse (SuC) – Dijon(SuC) – Auxerre(SuC) - Thiais(SuC) - Paris
A nice easy drive but I left late and hit the rush hour in Paris, absolute nightmare took me 90 mins to do approx 10 km.
Spent two days in Paris Parked the car and left it with 60% and sentry on, lost a few electrons , but nothing to panic over, Drove to Calais get the euro tunnel and then the ferry at Fishguard.
Numbers
4516 km
1012.9kWh (free)
224 Wh/km
Tolls
€180.90
1,888.7 Km
My main advice is get a Toll Tag.
https://www.bipandgo.com/en/
I believe you're referring to the "carte grise", rather than the green card, which is the log book.
I lived (and drove) in France for several years. There's little in the way of a laissez faire attitude when it comes to documentation, so get everything in order, just in case you need it, including your log book.
Watch out for "priorite a la droite" (https://www.drive-france.com/faqs/get-your-priorities-right/), keeps you on your toes in urban areas! Use your watch as a reminder as to which side of the white line to stay on (assuming you wear one on your left hand!). On motorways/dual carriageways, it's a breeze driving on the other side.
In general it's enjoyable driving in France, the roads are really well maintained, drivers have excellent lane discipline, and most of the rules of the road are the same. The scenery can be stunning too. My ultimate accomplishment was doing a few rings around the Arc de Triomphe, not recommended for a first trip though!
Bon voyage
Green cards haven't been required in the EU for many years.
Also keep in mind that there are some very strict rules for driving there.
You must have your documentation - driving license, insurance (green card required?)
You must have a range of items - warning triangle, reflective bibs, and others.
Spare bulbs are not mandatory, but if a bulb is not working and you don't have a spare, you get a hefty fine - payable on the spot.
https://www.greenflag.com/driving-in-europe/driving-advice/driving-in-france
Its 20+ years since I drove there, but you get used to the "wrong side" of the road fairly quickly.
Yes the merging lanes in France can be very short (whereas Germany goes for ridiculously tight exits.)
You're actually expected to move out of the right-hand lane at an on-slip if possible, to allow traffic in. Not sure if that's actually the law but it's certainly the custom.
This year for the first time in 10 trips, we crossed France with a toll tag (ATMB as recommended on here by a Boardsie).
Although it was a short route (Cherbourg-Strasbourg) we still encountered 12 peages, some of which the usual toll payer even managed to remain asleep for.
It was late evening and queues were minimal with at most 2 cars per queue, so the time saving per peage was 1-2 minutes.
All the peages we passed through this time enforced no more than 30kph, so it's not quite as efficient Ireland's 50kph+ drive through lanes.
Larger newer peages I think have faster drive-through lanes if my memory serves me right.
I was very happy with our tag and am looking forward to using it on the way back.
One thing I noticed driving in France is that the merging lanes on motorways are much shorter than here. This means that you can be on the mortorway driving in the slow lane whereupon you'll suddenly notice a guy on your right trying to merge and you'll have to react quickly. It also means that when you are merging, you won't have the same distance to merge as you have here so have the brain well in gear when joining motorways.
There is at least one blue sign with an arrow at every roundabout, it indicates that you keep right of the island i.e go anti-clockwise. Chances of missing the signs are very low.
Here's an example near Roscoff, note the two blue arrows, one on the approach and another at the island. And the lane helpfully curves to the right for the last 10m so it's very difficult to get it wrong.
https://goo.gl/maps/oYS32TWUEGjnXhSw6
My co-pilot is very unhelpful, but full of wisdom, and is able to shout " NO !" in various formats. ie what the F@#*, etc.. Helps pass the time 😁
How's your copilot? Mines useless, has her head buried in her hands every time I'm going for an overtake. Not the best when you need her eyes to keep an eye on your blind spot. Glad I got a car with blind spot warnings
I found it easy enough to get used to once there's traffic around. A few times I've been riding or motoring along for a little while on the wrong side of the road when there's no traffic.
The hairyness depends on if you have a RHD or LHD car and if you are driving or the passenger.
I am fairly used to driving on the right, i just have to concentrate for the first couple of hours and then it tends to come "naturally". What does tend to throw me some times is the roundabouts, I once went round the wrong way! also when overtaking on a sinlge carriage way road you have to hang back further so you can see further ahead and somtimes the cars behind tend to nip into the space between you and the one in front.
its not to difficult
hope you don't mind me hopping on this thread OP
how does it take to get use to driving on the right hand side - is it hairy at the start?😶
the_amazing_raisin wrote: » All that's left now is to enjoy your vacation Please tell us how you get on once you get back, it'd be great info for future travellers (I'm hoping to go next year)
tigerbalm_eu wrote: » Single tag. Caveat: I haven't received mine yet - its in the post - but they are clear its on single tag + reg number in Italy's case I think.
the_amazing_raisin wrote: » Does the Bip & Go work off a single tag? I think the Emovis one needs a seperate tag for each country
tigerbalm_eu wrote: » Planning a similar trip in my Taycan (my first long range EV drive) and I've ordered a tag from Bip & Go at https://www.bipandgo.com/en/ for convenience factor. I liked that the subscription charge only applies for the month(s) its used. I have also ordered (and received) my Air Certificates for France and Germany as I will be in some of the applicable cities.https://www.certificat-air.gouv.fr/en/https://www.germanemissionssticker.com
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