Our first trip to France - some lessons learned

[Gellyneck]

We make multiple European trips every year, and each time we notice several changes. One of this year's highlights was exactly this issue, but it happened in every country we visited, including the UK. Has the EU banned the use of flashers?

Think so. BMW and Audi seem to have de-listed them as part of the standard spec now!

 

[maison]

France is great but the French...

You have obviously done something to upset them!

 

[maison]

@Nicepix
Have to agree with most of your comments in your post, but we love the “relaxed” way of shopping, post office experience etc.

Our biggest bugbear is the wear and tear on our nerves when French drivers are approaching a main road from a side road. In Britain it tends to be, approach slowly and be prepared to stop. The French way is to approach as though you are not going to stop, only to brake suddenly and hard if something is coming. Causes heart in mouth moments.

Having said that we find driving standards in our rural area are generally good and drivers tend to be courteous.

Love France and most of the French people we meet!

 

[Anthea M]

Lo

We rocked up at an out of town shopping place to pick up a few bits and bobs. Most shops were shut 1215-1400... which just made us wonder how French workers buy anything during their lunchbreak. But as Frankie points out they're having...lunch!

We whiled away the time in the Auchan instead stocking up on wine, cheese and saucisson. An entirely productive use of time.

ving your description of your 1st trip!
Itall sounded so familiar!
After 9 years and many trips we have learnt when to drive, when to arrive and when to stock up with food or eat out!!!
The secret is don’t try many miles a day and as others say arive midday stay 2 days if it’s nice and enjoy the town , market etc!
Oh yes and always check out market days as divisions can take you miles round a tiny town!!!
Enjoy the lifestyle and adventures!!!

 

[Janiemou]

The secret is don’t try many miles a day and as others say arive midday stay 2 days if it’s nice and enjoy the town , market etc!

We often try to do that ... couple of hours driving, park up the van, have a lazy afternoon and then walk into town or jump on the bus the next day. We've done this several times this year, in Eguisheim, Beaune, Riquewihr, Innsbruck, Lazise, Rapallo, Cannes, Avignon & Bologna - all of them have campsites that are suitable and we've had some lovely interludes in our journeys.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[yodeli]

The French way is to approach as though you are not going to stop, only to brake suddenly and hard if something is coming. Causes heart in mouth moments.

Oh Dear , we've crossed path then .....sowwy

 

[maison]

Oh Dear , we've crossed path then .....sowwy

I can’t believe that a Lady like you would ever drive like that.

 

[yodeli]

I can’t believe that a Lady like you would ever drive like that.

Just ask JJ .....

 

[MyrtleGuru]

6. France is closed most of the time. For a nation of shopkeepers it can be difficult for us to appreciate that France is closed on a Sunday, Monday morning, every lunchtime (including the out of town centres) and by about 8pm in the evening. OK I exaggerate, but not much. I'm amazed the French economy is doing anything at all in terms of growth...

Reminds me of a particular cycling holiday many years ago in France. Being much younger and fitter back then, we would just strap a tent to the back of the bicycle, get on a ferry and go cycle-camping in France. Now, being on a bike means you can't carry much in the way of provisions, so you buy food along the way and you can't exactly travel far off route to find it. We wanted to buy food in one place we turned up in, but it turned out it was half-day closing (that used to be a thing in England too, generally on a Wednesday, as I recall). "No problem", I said, "We'll buy stuff tomorrow". So we went a bit hungry. By the next day we were in a different 'commune' and it turned out their half-day closing was on a different day i.e. the one we on which we arrived! This went on for a few days: it seemed wherever we turned up, the shops were closed. Cycling burns up a lot of calories, especially as it was particularly windy and seemingly always against us. I should add that we were rather impoverished at the time, so restaurants were out of the question -- well one per fortnight was within budget. One day we arrived at one of the Normandy landing beaches (can't remember which one) and spied a local Spar shop nearby that was actually open! Provisions (lots of them) were duly purchased and I think I spent a whole two hours without a pause consuming them -- like a lion that had gone days without a kill.

 

[bobandjanie]

Just ask JJ .....

We had the pleasure of Frankies driving, I was surprised how well her car goes and being a nervous passenger I let Janie sit in the front.

Looking forward to the next visit.
Bob and Janie.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[Lot lover]

When you are in France do not expect the French to behave in the same way as Brits do in Britain. You are visitors in our country so be grateful.

 

[P Jones]

OK, so another "teach your granny to suck eggs" post - but hopefully other newbies might find this helpful. Sorry it is long.

We took the newly-christened MotorBaguette with the ever-fragrant MrsW and the second teenage genepuddle to France recently on our first trip with it overseas. We learnt a number of valuable lessons (part of the point of the trip was getting to know the van) that might provide help (or comic relief!) to first-timers.

1. Just because it's a new van, doesn't mean everything works. We only got the van in the summer and the temp hasn't dropped below about 10 degrees ever since. Except when we were on the way to the tunnel when it was 4-5 degrees and the Memsahib started to complain about the rubbish Ducato cab heater. I started checking and the engine temp gauge struggled to get over the bottom line unless we were stopped. Suspect the thermostat is stuck open and only now noticeable that it is colder. Didn’t have tools and couldn’t source a stat at short notice between Cambridge and Folkestone… so we just put up with the lower fuel economy for the week. MrsW complained every day of cold toes when we were driving. I developed a selective and temporary hearing loss to that particular frequency

2. Don’t forget your euro adaptors for the refillable LPG tanks. Yes, she reminded me to buy them regularly in the run up to the off, no I didn’t do it, yes I thought we’d pop into an accessory shop en route, no we didn’t, yes we ran out of gas mid-week. Still it was an excuse to eat out in the evening. I could have borrowed one from the filling station no doubt, but we just planned aire stops with (mostly free) hook up.

3. Ditto the euro hose adaptor for fresh water. Yes she did, no I didn’t. Quick trip to a Bricomarche whilst she perused Maison Du Monde and that was sorted.

4. French aires are great. We found some great ones in little villages (Nogent le Roi being superb). But we learnt quickly it is better to arrive before dark than after. Firstly because they are not always easy to find, secondly because we don’t like to think we are disturbing people already parked, and thirdly because the best spots (especially those with free EHU) are snapped up early.

5. Apps are great. I’ve fitted an Android head unit to the cab and we have loads of apps installed instead of using the phones. We struggled with signal strength/bandwidth sometimes from tethering phones and the gene puddle’s laptop burned through 2gig of data one evening because he hadn’t switched off the Windows10 update optimisation service. Ouch. We will set up a MiFi system for the next trip and test if we need a roof antenna or not. The thread on here on sim card deals is very helpful info.

In terms of Apps, by far the best SatNav for us was Waze. I quite liked Sysgic Truck, but it was a bit unstable and despite having all the van’s dimensions plugged in it tried to take us under a 2.5m height restriction (which was clearly signed thankfully in advance.). Co-Pilot was rubbish visually and had a bug where it constantly cycled through all the voice commands - interestingly it goes up to “Take the tenth exit at the roundabout”, which I presume is the Arc de Triomphe! Googlemaps is pretty good too - but the offline maps seem to be much bigger downloads than other apps.

I couldn’t find an aire/site finder app that was really comprehensive – and we tried them all, buying most of the offline/enhanced version. SearchforSites was possibly the most comprehensive, with CamperContact and Camperstop pretty good too. Sadly in many cases the apps don’t scale well to 7” landscape screens like the head unit. Search for sites particularly has limited screen real estate due to all the menus and banners. Does anyone have a favourite to recommend?

6. France is closed most of the time. For a nation of shopkeepers it can be difficult for us to appreciate that France is closed on a Sunday, Monday morning, every lunchtime (including the out of town centres) and by about 8pm in the evening. OK I exaggerate, but not much. I'm amazed the French economy is doing anything at all in terms of growth...

7. Don’t overestimate how far you will get unless on tollroads. Our initial plan was to motor on down to Bordeaux via a first night and following day visiting the Thiepval memorial, spend a few days biking around and then motor back pdq. We planned a route that avoided the tollroads mostly. D and N roads are lovely to see the scenery, but slow (nice slow, but very slow progress mostly). We revised our plan and only went as far as the Loire. We used the tollroads to come back and made great progress – at a cost. Other than that, the driving was pretty pleasant and nowhere near as aggressive and competitive as the UK.

8. The Tunnel car park is a free aire on the way back. Although it says not to arrive more than two hours before departure, we arrived around 11pm for the 5.29 crossing and the car parks were deserted (it was mid-week at the end of October) and we were fine to bed down for the night.

9. It is superb fun. These were the kinds of holidays we hoped to have when we took the plunge and bought the van this year. It was a short but great trip to learn the van, and as we know France quite well it was helpful to learn these lessons here than on a longer trip further afield.

Can’t wait to get under the tunnel again. Sadly work and GCSEs for the second genepuddle mean this won’t be until May next year. But that gives lots of time for weekend trips in the UK instead!

thanks im from n.wales.pj

 

[Tony50]

I enjoyed and laughed at your post. We live in and love France. It does depend on where you are. Our local shops and butchers are open all week including Sunday mornings (the butchers closes on Mondays as well).

They open from 7 or 7.30am, close for lunch from 12 until 2 but remain open until 7.30pm. When we first started visiting France even the supermarkets closed at 12 (really!).

A special note. There has been much nonsense spoken recently on another thread about high taxes in France. They are only high if you are an employer as the health contributions are high for the people that you employ.

Apart from that exception they are about the same as the UK and certainly if you are employed by somebody there is not a great deal of difference with the added benefit of good pensions and good support if you become unemployed. Our house taxes for instance including the superb rubbish collection system are far lower than we were paying in the UK.

If you can come across one of the old Route National roads, arrow straight and passing through open countryside on a quiet day they are the most fabulous roads in the world.

The biggest benefit of living here is the road system. A country twice the size of the UK with the same size population and in general a better road system. I rest my case.

We are quite content living in the UK , and respect the decision of anybody that lives abroad, but, please don't come back when you have a health problem like so many , although we are retired and don't pay a NHS stamp/or employment Tax, we do enjoy free Health care and prescriptions and luckily perhaps we get good service from the NHS, although we do pay Taxes indirectly through shopping / vehicle fuel etc. We do of course resent people who have spent a lot of their lives living abroad coming back due to bad health etc. (This statement does not apply to Motorhomers on a long vacation)
We do enjoy our visits to France particularly seeing a different way of life , just one question is it true that when you have retired do you still have to make a contribution towards the French Health Service I was told years ago that this Lady told she has to pay about 30 Euros a month?

Not the perfect county but not far off from it. Move here as soon as you can and you will not regret it.

 

[Glas Robin]

thanks im from n.wales.pj

Which makes us two of the luckiest Funsters around!



Hwyl, Robin.

 

[nicholsong]

Which makes us two of the luckiest Funsters around!



Hwyl, Robin.

I am lucky - I am not from N. Wales.

^{_{Subscribers  do not see these advertisements}}

 

[pandas]

When you are in France do not expect the French to behave in the same way as Brits do in Britain. You are visitors in our country so be grateful.

were you thinking 'neighbourly'?

 

[Teuchter]

Phew ... the end is a tad better!! I thought for a minute how the hell did I manage to live in my country for that long!
Now: Banks opening on saturdays mornings will be shut on mondays, and basically most shops do the same . Week ends for shop keepers go from sundays to tuesdays mornings. A bit normal honestly. Why would "normal" people have 2 days on week ends and shop keepers have only one day.
Lunch time ..... do you work while you're having your lunch? If yes , then it's not lunch time , it's working time and instead of working you, cheeky you, are b***** eating! Not fair for your boss is it?

Now ....positive side, your post is very informative for newbies, and at least, you didn't decide to give a miss to France... Welcome then, indeed! And before you ask, no, of course not, I'm not offended, amused more like. You go to another country .... expect what goes with it! I bet Spain has different adaptators... and close at different times

Amicalement
Frankie

Frankie

Ma femme et moi aimons les Français et adorons la belle France. Nous visitons chaque année pendant six ou sept semaines. Je parle aussi un peu français et les français n'ont aucun problème à me comprendre - en fait, je suis souvent complimenté pour ma peonouciation (telle quelle)


Mais! - J'ai souvent du mal à comprendre ce que l'on me dit!!

 

[yodeli]

Frankie

Ma femme et moi aimons les Français et adorons la belle France. Nous visitons chaque année pendant six ou sept semaines. Je parle aussi un peu français et les français n'ont aucun problème à me comprendre - en fait, je suis souvent complimenté pour ma peonouciation (telle quelle)


Mais! - J'ai souvent du mal à comprendre ce que l'on me dit!!

You're doing fine obviously! As to understanding people, try to listen to french programs, it might help a bit