Moto Europa

"Are you the American who doesn't know how to drive?" asked the middle-aged businessman looking at me through the open passenger window of my car. His sharp double-breasted suit and gentlemanly delivery — with only a slight French accent — intimated his status as some sort of bigwig.

Uh-oh, I thought, I'm in trouble.

I leaned toward the passenger window, offered up a "That's me," and held a shrug of an expression on my face.

My words, all English, passed by tangentially the complex, aboriginally bearded profile of the French mechanic who sat so calmly beside me. Amiably yet without using a single word of English, that mechanic had spent the past fifteen minutes trying to teach me how to drive a manual transmission car.

Preserving my leaning position and pitiable countenance, I awaited a response from the businessman. Surprisingly, although he remained silent at the window, he didn't seem upset with me. I relaxed a bit and settled back in my seat.

Meanwhile he had produced a small rectangular case which he was presently holding open before the mechanic. Exotic brown cigarettes lined the inside. (I was told later in my trip that they weren't cigarettes but cigarillos, miniature cigars.) Apparently my situation was so serious it called for some sort of contemplative smoke — not, it seemed, a good sign, especially for a twenty-something, jet-lagged non-smoker from Iowa who couldn't drive a manual and who, on the first day of his first visit to Europe, sat behind the wheel of such car in downtown Paris just minutes before rush hour.

The mechanic took the case and snapped up a cigarillo while the suit introduced himself to me. "President of Renault USA" is all I heard. This was a bigger wig than I'd expected. They've called in the top brass, I thought. The mechanic was now offering the cigarillos to me. I pinched one. The mechanic took a light; I took a light; the bigwig lit up too. Voilá, the cig was smooth. I took another drag. … The jet lag, Paris, the poilu of a French mechanic, the extremely urbane businessman, the cigarettes — altogether surreal. Hey, I thought, this is cool.

"Why didn't you get an automatic transmission?" asked the businessman.

"Uh, well, the manual transmissions were quite a bit cheaper," I answered. "I didn't think it would be so difficult to learn."

My anxiety was back and it punctuated the end of my statement with a series of nose-laughs exhausted across my ironical grin, which grin presently deliquesced, all evidence of my anxiety retreating to my eyeballs. I looked at the businessman, then at the mechanic, then back at the businessman. Go ahead, I wished, laugh at me. Please. I know I'm foolish but you gotta credit my bravado. Typical American bravado — both our strength and our weakness. Laugh. Laugh. P-leeze, I need a good laugh.

The businessman looked at me, nodded slightly, took a drag and looked away in thought. The mechanic stared at the car floor and began his own subtle nodding. I wasn't gonna get my laugh. No, these guys were too cool to get mad or laugh at me; they just wanted to help. Nevertheless I wanted to escape.

Suddenly I remembered sleep and instantly began to drift off to it. But my ego, considering this phase of the trip more a mission than a vacation, slapped me straightaway with the stolid injunction it'd been holding all along: There will be no turning back. Adhering to the mission meant driving a manual transmission. I knew an automatic would cost some US$500 more; I didn't want to pay US$500 more. Still, I thought, maybe I should give in and get an automatic. I asked the businessman whether he had an automatic available and if so how much it would cost.

"I'll have to investigate," he responded with typical equanimity. "It will take about one-half hour. How long do you want the car for?"

"Ninety days," I said.

Perfect. I had a half-hour in which to hone enough skills and summon enough guts to get out and about on the streets of Paris. If I couldn't cut it with the manual, I could come back and get an automatic. I stubbed out the cigarillo.

"If I'm not here when you come back," I added, "it means I decided to take this car."

The businessman went to check the inventory. The mechanic got out and tended to other business. I methodically put the car in gear and circled where I'd been circling, around the pillars dividing the entry and exit to the parking garage. First gear, second gear, first gear, neutral, reverse, neutral, stall. First gear, second gear…. I circled several times before pausing, consciously taking a deep breath, re-reconciling my mental map of the city with the stylized one — half map, half advertisement for McDonald's — on the seat next to me, and tentatively rolling toward the street.

Now under the unforgiving afternoon early May sun, I promptly stalled the engine for the umpteenth time that day. These people are ignorant of the dangerous tyro now on their streets, I thought. Pedestrians were going about their business — old men shuffling, mothers issuing children across the busy street, fashionable women striding with purpose — all as if the two-ton projectiles zipping past them were driven by souls possessed of Mario Andretti's skills. I chuckled in the high pitch of disbelief and set out to make my unique contribution to the chaos.

Less than a hundred meters later — and before making my first turn — the high resistance that is Paris's desultory web of roadways had upped my anxiety enough to melt the mental map which moments before had seemed so crystalline, leaving a fugitive remnant that, despite all my straining to read signposts and to reinterpret Ronald McDonald's Paris, I couldn't build on or even save. If taken as the summation of my wrong turns, I became effectively dissolved, here there and everywhere, Schrödinger's Cat in the black box of the "City of Light."

Yes, Paris had swallowed me with all the perfunctory efficiency of a septuagenarian taking a pill.… But I wasn't going down smoothly: I stalled the car one, two, three, four — I don't know how many times. The French reserve honks for the most awful driving exhibitions; I felt like a hated goose on some mad migration I'd caused to go awry. I refused to make eye contact with anyone for fear of suffering a just humiliation. I shrank down like the vowels in the word fool, the car's body affording thin consonants of protection against an imaginary paragraph — no, page — of human types who from virtually all positions possible shared singular delight in deriding my every action.

Maybe I should take this thing back! … No, just don't hit something or someone, I told myself, remembering the mantra of my high school driver's education instructor. "It doesn't matter if you miss'm by the width of a hair," he loved to say, "  — as long as you don't hit 'em!"

I turned on the radio. Almost instantly a familiar song commenced. It was a new hit by Lenny Kravitz, and one of my favorites. The initial buzzing guitar riffs and screaming vocals soon gave way to the title question — " Are you gonna go my way?" The song still raging, I stopped at a red light. Without taking my eyes off the light, I lifted the spent cigarillo from the clean ash tray of the spanking-new car and stuck it loosely under my right upper lip. The smell of the tobacco mingled with the ambient, uniquely French new-car smell (blueberries?). The light turned green. I took a deep breath. The tobacco hit my taste buds. Lenny hit a high note. I hit the accelerator. Ninety days and 24,696 kilometers (14,817 miles) later, on schedule, unscathed, and guilty of only a few minor and inconsequential traffic offenses, I would return the car to Paris.

— Eric Bredesen, Moto Europa author and Managing Director of Motorvana

Myth: Europeans drive on the left side of the road.

True only in the UK, Ireland, Cyprus and Malta.

Myth: It's difficult to get the proper documents.

Provided you're at least 18 years of age, your domestic driving license is usually all you need. Austria, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Russia and Spain do require non-Europeans to carry also an International Driving Permit (IDP). The AAA sells IDPs for about US$20. Many car and RV rental companies in Europe require customers to be over 23 or 25 years of age, but French tax-free short-term car leases (ranging from 17 days to 1 year) are available in Europe to persons as young as 18.

Myth: Fuel costs in Europe make driving a car there three to four times more expensive than driving a car in North America.

The price of gasoline in Europe is generally three to four times higher than in North America. But the gasoline-powered vehicles of Europe are more fuel-efficient than those of North America. What's more, diesel vehicles are widespread. Diesels run about 20 percent more efficiently than gasoline-powered vehicles; and in continental Europe, diesel fuel is about 30 percent cheaper than gasoline.

Myth: Parking a car in Europe is a nightmare.

Free parking spots abound on the streets, at train stations, at tourist sites, at provincial hotels and motels, and, yes, at hostels. This abundance prevails especially off the beaten path, precisely where a motor vehicle can take you. Expect to pay only about US$50 per month for parking.

Myth: Europeans are crazy drivers.

The European driving style is faster and more chaotic than the style in the USA, but Europeans generally are better drivers than are Americans. Compared to the US count of 1.47 deaths and 92.32 injuries per 100 million vehicle kilometers, the UK counts only 0.54 and 48.82 respectively, Germany 0.80 and 73.11, France 0.89 and 19.42 — this despite the fact that the average kilometer of roadway in the UK or Germany bears nearly twice as many vehicles as the average kilometer of US roadway, and the average French road bears about the same number of vehicles as the average US road. Indeed, European drivers customarily demonstrate remarkable patience and goodwill: honking is kept to a minimum; slow drivers pull over onto the shoulder or otherwise signal to let faster drivers pass; the faster drivers wave or beep in appreciation.

Myth: European roads are prohibitively vestigial and confusing.

Wrong again. A comprehensive network of new expressways (autoroutes, Autobahnen, etc.) crisscrosses the entirety of Western Europe. In Austria, France, Italy, Spain and Switzerland you must pay tolls on most of these sleek roads; but in the rest of Europe they are free of charge. Avoiding expressways, though, is advised and easy. Parallel to the expressways run the highways that once served as the main highways. Typically these secondary highways afford much more interesting scenery and experiences than do the expressways and are in excellent condition. Regardless, navigation is a breeze. European traffic-control and road-signage measures are either remarkably similar to those employed in North America or else sufficiently heuristic as to be easily followed by foreigners. Moreover, coming into a town, everything tends to fall into place if you follow the ubiquitous signs to the town center or train station. The parking lot at the train station will be at your disposal — often free of charge. Even the infamous roundabouts that increase in frequency with your proximity to a city or town — especially in the UK and France — make navigation easy, as they provide for any number of revolutions while you figure out which turn to make.

Myth: Crossing borders with a car is a long and nervewracking process.

Border crossing is usually free of hassle. Often you need not even stop.

Myth: Driving is a lonely process.

For starters, driving will amount to a great subject for conversation and it'll grace you with a certain mystique in the eyes of the fellow travelers you'll meet. Surely some of these travelers will ask to travel with you. Regardless, persons traveling accompanied will rediscover the special intimacy that develops during a road trip.

Myth: One way car rental in Europe is extremely expensive.

Not so if the one way car rental itinerary falls within the same country. For extra-country one ways, you might do best to book a French tax-free short-term car lease instead. Such auto leases require payment for a minimum 13 or 21 days but their extra-country one way fees are quite nominal. Moreover, such car leases tend to be far better deals than long term car rentals in Europe.

* 2011 "Statistics of Road Traffic Accidents in Europe and North America," a United Nations publication; and www.data.WorldBank.org.

Why drive Europe? In relating the nine myths about European motor travel, I've told you the fuel costs, the toll costs and the parking costs associated with a motoring tour of Europe. But how does the economics of motor travel compare to that of rail travel? In this respect an edition of budget-travel guru Rick Steves' Europe Through the Backdoor newsletter pointed out, "Every year, as train prices go up, car rental — even one way car rental — becomes a better option for budget travelers in Europe. It's surprisingly easy. While the lion's share of travelers are planning on train travel, you should at least consider the driving option."

Even if motor travel works out to be more expensive for you than rail travel, the value afforded by motoring tends to be greater and often justifies a greater expenditure. Many people hold that the value realizable in European travel is inversely proportional to the number of people traveling Europe at any one time. This is partly true. Europe does accommodate millions of tourists, and the crowds do become overwhelming at times, spoiling the integrity of the experience. Yet Europe is a big place. In most cases travelers who claim that the whole continent is saturated assume this based on samplings of anomalous concentrations of people. Apart from the sights that tend to concentrate visitors, the modes of transport which most visitors opt for — trains and bus tours — play a primary role in contributing to these concentrations. Trains and buses tend to lock you onto the beaten path, where you'll visit the same places and meet the same — often, understandably, jaded — locals that other travelers meet. This phenomenon results in something like 90 percent of the travelers frequenting 10 percent of the places. To this I say, "Great! These mobs are leaving the rest of the place to we intrepid types."

A motor vehicle allows you to wave goodbye to the sweaty throngs and the sometimes nasty, phony or otherwise fraudulent entities that dine on them. Of course once you're away from the tourist hordes, finding accommodation becomes easier. And prices tend to be cheaper off the beaten path. Regardless, traveling by motor vehicle forces both budget traveler and royalty alike to travel — to live — more like a local. Indeed I've found that the more business I do in Europe — including the procuring and driving of a motor vehicle — the less I act and feel like a tourist and the more I feel charged up with integrity.

A motor vehicle is like a special ticket to the great museum of the present. What makes the ticket so valuable is the flexibility it bestows. You can go where you want when you want. You're subject neither to train nor bus schedules nor to the strikes that all too often wipe them out. You have door-to-door capability. You can toss in virtually as much luggage as you like and transport it straight to a place where you can undue all the zippers. And you don't have to pay for all the short bus trips to outlying accommodations and sights. Essentially you have no downtime.

Some people might argue that motor vehicles are slower than trains and that the time spent driving should be considered downtime. That's largely a bad attitude speaking. I just mentioned the advantage of doing otherwise mundane business in Europe. As the operator of your own vehicle — of your own tour — you're doing business of sorts. Even if you never get out of your vehicle, driving forces you to look at a physical map and to work at creating a mental map, an understanding of the continuum that is Europe. You'll read the landscape while navigating it, and it's just as good a read as any book. Remember, necessity is the mother of invention; when riding trains or buses — which allow you to exercise your vision but don't require you to exercise a map — your understanding of the continuum, your mental map, is rarely constructed. It's only natural: the more you let other people think for you during your trip the less you'll know about the place when you leave. It reminds me of a Burma Shave (shaving cream) sign I'm told long ago graced US 30, the "Lincoln Highway," as that road ran through my home state of Iowa on its way from New York to California: "DON'T LOSE YOUR HEAD TO GAIN A MINUTE," the sign warned. "YOU NEED YOUR HEAD, YOUR BRAINS ARE IN IT." Rather altruistically this advertisement evokes images of horrible automobile accidents; but there are myriad more ways by which the value of your head can be compromised. Jumping on an overnight train or bus in Seville, for instance, and the next morning waking in Paris has its advantages, but the increased value of your head that results from experiencing how Seville connects to Paris is not among them.

And even during the day, trains constrain your vision. Trains, of course, run on tracks. Train tracks are much cheaper to build and trains more efficient to operate if the tracks run across flat ground. So train routes tend to follow the flattest land available — and the flattest land available tends to be unexciting. Even when trains venture into the mountains they spend much of their time in pitch-black tunnels. And even if the train window isn't dirty and you have a great view, it's gonna to be the same view that everybody else sees. What's more you won't be able to smell the pine or feel the breeze or hear the birds or taste the local wine. While train travel passively constrains your vision of the outside world, it strives to completely shield all your other senses.

Indeed you'll exercise the most important aspect of a motor vehicle's flexibility when you stop and open its doors. You can stop for photo ops. You can drop into this or that intriguing winery, taste a few samples of red and buy a bottle for dinner. You can stop and talk with that farmer or that group of old men or children on the corner. You can pull up and watch that local soccer or rugby or cricket match. If when passing a mountain stream on a hot day you see people swimming in a cool natural pool below, you can pull over and join them, like I did. In a train you zip by such joys. Compared to a day of motoring, a day of traveling by train greatly diminishes the chances that you and your stories will serve as objects of fascination later on. You're going to Europe to further your understanding of the world. Well, Europe and the world are infinitely more than hundreds of disjointed cities. Between those cities are thousands upon thousands of wonders, many of them untold or undiscovered, the perfect ingredients for adventure — get mixed up in 'em.

Among the wonders you can explore are thousands of outstanding campgrounds and ideal spots for camping that only a motor vehicle will allow you to frequent. It's worth noting that without a partner or two, camping is a bit too lonesome for me. As such I do most of my camping when traveling with friends.

This brings up a good point. You may worry that by driving you'll miss out on the social situations that pop up on train rides. You will miss out on those. But in a way driving will make meeting people even easier. Driving is a great subject for conversation, giving you an added mystique when you exchange stories with fellow travelers. Many of these travelers will want to travel with you; and if you're so inclined you'll be able to choose whom you want to share the traveling and costs with. (Although you'll have a tough time getting tag-alongs to pay for more than their share of the fuel costs.) Regardless, if you're traveling accompanied, you'll rediscover the special intimacy that develops during a road trip. Something about driving with good company spawns the best conversations.

Another putative advantage of rail travel is the overnight train ride which allows passengers to save a night's lodging expense and to maximize their sight-seeing time. Yet on top of missing many sights along the way, these night-train folks often arrive at their destination tired. You can expect to get only about five or six hours of sleep on a typical overnight train ride. I don't know about you but that's not enough sleep for me to feel good the next day. And I want to to feel good while I'm in Europe. As a motor traveler I average about eight hours of sleep each night. Moreover, not marching to someone else's schedule, I wake without an alarm — a vacation in itself. To get more sleep on a train, you'll have to fork over US15 for a couchette. A couchette is a bed in a compartment — sometimes lockable, sometimes not — with two triple coed bunks (blanket, pillow, clean linen, and up to five compartment mates included). An attendant monitors the couchette and deals with conductors and customs officials for you. You could also opt to pay US40–80 for a two- or three-bed sleeper with a sink.

Whether you travel by train or not, you should expect to make several mistakes and face several surprises along the way. By giving you the ability to turn around in an instant, to act immediately on what intrigues you, to seize the moment, a motor vehicle empowers you to manage and exploit these inevitable wildcards. "A traveler who leaves the journey open to the road finds unforeseen things come to shape it. 'The fecundity of the unexpected,' Proudhon called it." So writes William Least Heat-Moon in Blue Highways, his critically acclaimed account of traveling around the US in a camper van. This fecundity of the unexpected assumes a much more powerful dimension in motoring tours than in train or bus tours, and he's a wise traveler who ultimately and strategically surrenders to it in both the planning and execution of a trip. In other words, as a recent television advert has it, "Plan to be spontaneous."

It is prudent, however, to focus for a moment on the unpleasant unexpected happenings that may occur. Crime is a prime example. When traveling, of course, you're subject to a higher likelihood of petty crime than are the locals. Still, in many ways Europe is the safest continent in the world, and virtually no place in Europe is prohibitively dangerous for travelers. Yet in choosing to travel by motor vehicle you're choosing to travel closer to the ground, to open yourself more to the local population — including the subgroup of criminals. But the criminals probably won't be there to take advantage of you: their prospects are much better on trains, around train stations, and among the mobs I mentioned earlier. In other words, criminals go where the crowds go.

Perhaps no other phenomenon takes the potential for both pleasant and unpleasant experiences to the extreme as does hitchhiking — or "autostop," as Europeans call it. Many sources advise that picking up hitchhikers in Europe is a mistake. I'm not gonna to go that far. Unlike North Americans, Europeans accept hitching as an integral mode of transport. Thus a much wider sample of European society sticks out its collective thumb along the highways, improving the chances that your experiences with hitchhikers there will be pleasant if not wonderful. There are even organizations throughout Europe that match riders with drivers. Use your best judgment when it comes to hitchhiking. You're under no obligation to pick up anybody.

Many people consider touring Europe by bicycle. Of course bicycling leads to intimate experiences with the landscape and the people. But you'll pay for that intimacy: bicycle touring is hard work, and there's no way you can get around much of Europe by bicycle unless you have a ton of time and tremendous stamina. I know because I've met several bicyclists during my travels and I recently attempted — with limited success — to bike around Britain and Ireland in a month and a half. A good bicyclist on a long tour typically covers about 100 kilometers (66 miles) a day, an effort which requires about six or seven hours on the road and results in mild exhaustion in the evenings. You will sleep well but unless you're an experienced bicyclist you may get in over your head and end up dreading the next day. With the great effort inherent in such bicycling you can't justify many deviations from your planned route, and to avoid superfluous physical expenditure you must plan that route with extreme care. The overwhelming tendency, then, is to limit yourself, to keep on the move, to pass up the fecundity of the unexpected. In short, you'd better love bicycling for the sake of bicycling. Moreover you should seriously consider covering only 66 to 83 km (40 to 50 miles) per day. If you travel by motor vehicle you can still do substantial bicycling. In fact a motor vehicle facilitates enjoyable bicycle travel. With a bike carrier and/or industrial strength rubber bands, you can secure your bike(s) on your vehicle and drive across boring or hilly country before mounting the two-wheelers; and you can travel comfortably in the vehicle during unpleasant weather.

This brings up a very important point. Your choice of transport doesn't have to be either/or. You can combine motoring and rail travel and bicycling or whatever. For example, you can tool around the countryside for a week or two in a car rental, avoiding the snarled traffic and other troubles of the cities, and then bounce between a handful to cities over the next week or so using trains. Furthermore it may surprise you that there are "motorail" trains which will carry you and your car from A to B. And as you might suspect, most trains accept bicycles for a small charge.

Now that you understand the myths concerning European motor travel and you're thinking in terms of value, you're primed to make a good decision about how to tackle Europe. If you're worried that you're not up to the challenge of savoring Europe's roads, take heart in the True Story about my first day driving in Europe.

Traveling by motor vehicle offers unparalleled access to the land and to the people and creatures that inhabit it. If you take advantage of this power and weave your itinerary with a spirit of adventure, with a desire to learn about places and people and about yourself, with a willingness to shed the familiar, a willingness to change, you'll find it quickened by the unexpected; you'll feel it assuming wonderful dimensions; you'll put it on and go go go; and it'll fit like a glove.

Of course you can vitalize your itinerary simply by the tried and true method of leaving the beaten path — and I do heartily recommend this tactic. Yet humanity has run rough-shod over the expanse of Europe for untold thousands of years. As a result, there are lots of beaten paths. Many of these paths are hard to avoid; many are glorious and should be sought.

What's most remarkable, then, about the state of the continent is its ubiquitous and seemingly irrepressible natural beauty. From the verdant Pyrénées to the savannah-like wilds of Hoge Veluwe National Park in the Netherlands, from the dusty plains of Southern Spain to the misty and precipitous fjords of Norway, from the stretching lochs of Scotland to the angel-hair falls on the sculpted cheeks of Swiss valleys, wonderful nature waits both on and off the beaten path.

As for Europe's civilization, it hasn't yielded fully to the virus of pyramid-bedecked strip malls, coast-to-coast culture-clones, and all the homogenizing effects of 20th-century machinery. In the villages of France, people yet ride rickety black bicycles with a baguette strapped across the rear rack; and groups of old men sit-out the afternoon on corners along the main roads, recounting and making and becoming stories. In Scotland and Wales and Ireland, farmers still call to their children the ancient Gaelic language. Alongside tidal rivers in Portugal, knotty-knuckled fishermen stand, leather-skinned and wincing, in the heavy afternoon, their fingers moving furiously to untangle nets, everything else — from their thick-soled black shoes to their greasy blue-gray pants to their bent backs to the hang of their necks to the slow sideways turns of their heads in the dense shadows of their hats to the oil blue sky — seeming sapped of time and swollen with the ocean's inertia; jazz drifts from the restaurants there and drops in the street. Levity is the rule not far away in Spain, where past low white-washed houses on dusty dirt streets, black-clad men beneath thin black hats ride high in the saddle and hugged from behind by women whose long dresses caparison the horses too. Even in tourist-choked Venice you can stroll as the lone anachronism in alleyways under windows open to the ever coming and peaceful night, the meal-time cling-clangs and banter of ghostly Venetians the repast of your haunt. This must be exactly the way it was, you'll think.

Indeed, from our perspective ghosts still pass for neighbors in Europe: they live on and compose the physical and cultural fabric of the continent. But as such, these ghosts are dynamic and cannot be captured by canned descriptions or preconceived notions — although they will play along. Consider the words of esteemed historian Daniel J. Boorstin.

Modern tourist guides [circa 1961] have helped raise tourist expectations. And they have provided the natives — from Kaiser Wilhelm down to the villagers of the Chichacestenango — with a detailed and itemized list of what is expected of them and when. These are the up-to-date scripts for actors on the tourists' stage.

Yet if you let the natives tender their story instead of encouraging them to reinforce yours, you may even make friends with a few. In fact they rather than some book should function as your primary guides.

Nevertheless, you should use a good guidebook or two. Indeed, I specifically designed this book to go hand in hand with one by leaving out detailed descriptions of sights, accommodations, etc. Guidebooks should function as the islands of information from which you launch journeys of true discovery. In other words, sometimes it's best to put your trust in a guidebook and sometimes it's best to put the guide away.

Besides, you don't want to work too hard at having a good time: such work can be a pain and it tends to be misguided. Remember the fecundity of the unexpected I spoke of in the chapter Why Drive Europe? How the wise traveler — indeed the true traveler — must ultimately surrender to it? Here's what intrepid traveler and novelist Lawrence Durrell had to say about that.

Journeys, like artists, are born not made. A thousand different circumstances contribute to them, few of them willed or determined by the will — whatever we may think.

An example of this fecundity is a visit I made to the little town of Dômme, in France's Dordogne River valley. I happened to meet an American woman at one of the valley's many caves that house prehistoric paintings. She told me I must go to Dômme. She didn't offer much more advice, just that I should go. I'd planned to go to Bordeaux that day; I went to Dômme instead. Well, the view of the valley from the bluff Dômme sits on overwhelmed me as much as a stretch of peaceful space can. Later in my journeys I met a guy who became a good friend, and I told him about the view at Dômme; I was proud to possess this relatively esoteric piece of travel knowledge, and I enjoyed relating the experience, wrestling with it to draw some meaning, verbally painting its picture, making it mine. When I returned home, that friend sent me a letter with this quote by one of my favorite writers, Henry Miller.

Just to glimpse the black, mysterious river at Dômme from the beautiful bluff at the edge of town is something to be grateful for all of one's life. I believe that this great peaceful region of France will always be a sacred spot for man and that when the cities have killed off the poets this will be the cradle of poets to come … it gives me hope for the future of the race, for the future of the earth itself.… The Dordogne will live on just as dreams live on and nourish the souls of men.

It was as if back there at Dômme I'd looked at a great painting for the first time — with no preconceptions — and felt exactly what the painter had felt when he created it. Indeed, many artists and art historians abhor the trite explanations which plaques or tapes afford the museum-goer. Such connoisseurs prefer to open themselves to the art rather than to some canned description of it; they trust primarily their own reactions; they know this approach is their only hope of maximally experiencing the art. It's like when you nudge a child and say, "Go take a look": you may want to describe a wonder to the child, but you know it's in their best interests to let them discover it for themselves. Once a writer describes a place and once you've read that description before arriving there, the place, in at least one way, is lost to you forever: your impression of that place will always be distilled through the eyes and words of another. Not an altogether bad thing, but not the type of thing that makes for discoveries. My original ignorance of that natural work of art that is the view from Dômme, my original ignorance of Henry Miller's or any other writer's or traveler's description it, lets me claim my experience of the place as my own; it let me experience a discovery. And long after I left Dômme, that ignorance let me truly connect with the very thoughts — seemingly still wet in the brain — of one of my favorite writers. Sometimes it's better to learn about a place after you've traveled to it.

Still, most of us already have a collection of knickknack notions about Europe, ideas that we tend to employ as the linchpins of our itineraries. Of course these ideas work just fine to support a bric-a-brac set of experiences, but they give way under an itinerary laden with reality. And that's what we're after isn't it, reality. But how to come up with an itinerary that will sop it up?

Well, since the ideal teachers are waiting all over Europe, and since I'm just as likely as you to bias the itineraries I come up with, and, what's more, since it'd be hypocritical to define a path when it's my stated goal to help you leave the beaten path, I'm not gonna delineate specific itineraries. Besides, there are already a handful of guides that do this. But not only are such itineraries suspect spiritually, they're suspect practically as well: it's virtually impossible to properly treat the continuum that a motor vehicle opens to you. Czech author Milan Kundera captured the essence of these basic faults when he wrote,

A route differs from a road … because it is merely a line that connects one point with another. A route has no meaning in itself; its meaning derives entirely from the two points that it connects. A road is a tribute to space. Every stretch of road has meaning in itself and invites us to stop. A route is the triumphant devaluation of space, which thanks to it has been reduced to a mere obstacle to human movement and a waste of time.

In attempting to strike the right balance between interacting with the locals (or, for that matter, with your fellow travelers), using a guidebook or two, using your own head, and surrendering to the fecundity of the unexpected, you'll naturally imbue your travels with the kind of spirit that makes for invaluable experiences.

Nonetheless, a systematic analysis of more mundane issues is necessary to manage that effort and let it work its magic amid the unavoidable constraints of time and space and resources, constraints that suggest certain patterns for the grand scale design of your itinerary. You might notice that I include no topographical and very little road-condition information in this book. I omit the first kind of info because I don't want to waste your time with verbal descriptions of landscapes when maps can pictorially give you much more precise, thorough and immediate information. A picture is worth a thousand words, right? Even non-topographic maps are filled with clues about the nature of the landscape: you can bet that the more winding the roads the more problematic and interesting the landscape.

It's worth noting here that mountainous countries such as Austria, Norway and Switzerland boast mountain tunnels — oftentimes marked on maps by dotted lines — which allow roads or trains to carry motor vehicles through. Many of these tunnels are disconcertingly long and many run below natural passes and in an essentially parallel relation to a much older road which painstakingly but beautifully negotiates the vertical as well as the horizontal.

In Switzerland especially it's often impossible to "make good time" unless you use the expressways and tunnels. Check your Switzerland road map carefully when planning your schedule. But besides realizing the limits that the hyper-meandering roads impose, you should realize the potential they offer — increasingly breathtaking views on every turn. Plan to drive for driving's sake, and try to minimally constrain yourself with time-related issues. Ask yourself this question: Why do I want to drive quickly and horizontally through Switzerland?

Switzerland's postal coaches are famous for challenging the third dimension and thus providing unrivaled service to the extents of the country. Experienced chauffeurs with special training captain these coaches (which have three independent brake systems) on half- and full-day excursions along the backroads — both high and low. You can even take hand luggage of up to 50 kg (110 lbs.) free of charge.

As for road conditions, virtually none of the roads in present day Europe constitute a prohibitive threat to your safety or your plans; their condition should play little to no role in the planning of your itinerary. Go where you want to go.

Countries with toll roads demand more attention if you want to avoid paying tolls. Mountainous terrain of course, as alluded to earlier, demands especially careful planning because of the up-and-down and winding nature of the roadways — and the unusually slow and difficult-to-predict pace of travel that results.

But don't get hung up now on the details. It's both more realistic and more cost-effective to address many of these issues when you're out on the road rather than when you're at home. Why overwhelm yourself with info you're likely to forget before you need it? For one thing, your instincts will quickly process most of the driving situations you'll encounter; and what's too complex for them will probably be easy pickings for your analytical side. Hey, besides this or any other guide, you've got untold millions of years of evolution going for you.

What's more, saving some studying and decisions until later tends to jive with the spirit of adventure and the fecundity of the unexpected that I discussed earlier. Indeed, it's arguable that you should minimize the planning you do each travel-day. There's so much to do and see in Europe that you'll never be at a loss for wonderful new experiences: everything will tend to fall into place. This tendency is especially strong in a motoring tour. Despite all the flexibility that a motor vehicle gives you, it also constrains you. The reasonable per-day distance associated with motor travel is much less than that associated with rail travel. Immediate options are limited: the next day's destination should lie within roughly a two hundred-mile radius. The route that tends to emerge and often makes sense is some sort of circuit or circular route. As such, the next destination usually emerges as obvious.

For those of you without much time in which to travel, adhering to a practical circular route may keep you from experiencing the kind of variety that you want to experience. Well, by putting your vehicle on a train or by dropping off a rented or leased vehicle somewhere other than where you picked it up, you can effect linear itineraries. Driving an essentially straight route allows you to experience great variety at a leisurely pace and in a relatively short time.

The French rail system, SNCF, offers a service called "Trains-autos-couchettes" that can take you and your car and passengers overnight to destinations in Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Spain, and Switzerland. Finland's trains also provide such a service. In fact, the train systems of most countries offer some sort of auto-train service (called "Motorail" in English, "Autoreisezuge" in German, "Treni per Auto Accompagnate" in Italian, and "Trenes de Autos" in Spanish). Look for signs reading "auto/train" and depicting car-carrying flat beds or box cars.

Apart from offering the merits of a linear route, the advantages of traveling by Motorail include savings on gas and tolls (you'll take toll roads if you want to make the best possible time; figure about 0.2 per mile, 0.12 per kilometer) and the avoidance of wear and tear on your vehicle and yourself. Motorail trains make far fewer stops than typical trains; you travel faster and without having to change trains. Of course traveling overnight by train frees the daylight hours for other pursuits. Some sort of sleeping accommodation is compulsory on most overnight Motorail services. These accommodations range from, say, first class single-bed sleepers to second class couchettes holding six berths costing far less.

But the savings don't necessarily stop with the above. The European-wide hotel chains Ibis, Mercure, Novotel, and Minotel grant reduced rates to SNCF (not just Motorail) travelers, as does Avis. Several ferry services do the same — but for Motorailers only. These include the following which cross between Britain or Ireland and the continent: Brittany Ferries, Hoverspeed, Le Shuttle (through the Chunnel), P&O European Ferries, and Stena Sealink. Motorailers will also get discounts when plying the sea between France, Corsica or Sardinia on SNCM Ferryterranée, and between Spain and the Balearic Islands on Transmediterranea.

Stena Sealink also offers tickets combining Motorail service with their Landbridge ferry service that connects Ireland to the continent by way of Britain. The offerings include one-way ferry passage plus one-way Motorail travel, return ferry plus one-way Motorail, and return ferry plus return Motorail.

Whether a linear route will save you money depends on several factors. Let's say, for example, you got a good deal on a return flight to London and you want to taste a little of England before getting a car and driving at a leisurely pace to Rome. Let's also say that you have three weeks to get to Rome and back to London. Finally, let's say you lease a car for free delivery in Calais. One option would be to pay to leave the car in Rome, before returning to Calais by train, or by plane to London. Another option would be to make flight arrangements into London and out of Rome — arrangements, however, which may cost much more than a simple return flight to and from London. Motorail allows you to take delivery of the car in Calais, drive it to Rome, and put it on an overnight train back to Calais.

Regardless of whether you plan to travel a circuitous or linear route, you'll have to start from a city. But you do not need a motor vehicle to see a European city. At least you don't want to begin your trip by doing lots of driving in a city: not only is it unnecessary, but it's also the most difficult driving you'll encounter in Europe. Plan to see the city in the days before you get the vehicle or in the days after you return it — or both. I recommended you do both. A vibrant city may be just what the doctor ordered to battle the jet lag at the beginning of your trip; while as a more experienced European traveler, you'll be more relaxed at the end of your trip and able enjoy the sophisticated side of a place like Paris much more than you were in the beginning.

Once off the beaten path you should have little trouble finding quality and relatively inexpensive accommodations — even during the high season. Unless you plan to rent a property or properties, consider making few accommodation reservations, some to cover the nights you'll spend in the city or cities you fly in or out of and some, perhaps, for your first day or two on the road, just to encourage a smooth start. Abstain from developing a detailed schedule. Also, think twice before driving on a holiday weekend. Not only are the roads more crowded on such weekends but so are hotels and restaurants. The Easter holiday and the two weeks around it play host to the worst crowds and traffic — especially in Southern Europe. On the other hand, many interesting festivals take place around holidays. My advice is that you plan your trip to include a national holiday but that you don't plan to travel much during that holiday.

To estimate distances, mark your map's scale on the edge of a piece of paper and then move the marked edge around your general route, adding the miles or kilometers as you go and using your imagination to add miles or kilometers to winding sections. Most atlases and maps, however, boast tables relating driving distances between major cities.

If you plan to do the classic grand tour, consider circling south early in the year, enjoying the early season warmth and avoiding the high season heat, humidity, crowds and prices.

The further south you go the more prevalent becomes petty crime. Most European countries don't experience a high incidence of vehicle theft. Unless you're driving a very expensive vehicle, thieves probably won't consider taking the vehicle itself. The taxis in Western Europe are evidence of this — they're Mercedes. Still, the South is noted for its high incidence of theft from vehicles. The cities of Seville, Spain, and Naples, Italy, are infamous hotbeds of such crime. Instead of taking your vehicle into Naples, stay on the Ischia or Sorrento Peninsula and take the catamaran or aliscafi to the city. Otherwise, try parking out of view of the streets in such cities, or park on the street but near a place where traffic police are working or in front of banks or embassies where security measures are in place already. Parking on the even the busiest street in broad daylight won't help. Thieves, usually in packs of three or four, cruise the streets looking for foreign-registered vehicles, which they pilfer in a matter of seconds.

No matter where you are in Europe, don't leave any valuables in your vehicle if you can help it. Leave the glove compartment open and emptied. If you have a hatchback, take off the shield that conceals the trunk space. Pull down the back seat that gives access to the trunk. Consider leaving the passenger door unlocked: thieves will get in a locked door easily, but they may break a lock or a window doing it. In short, don't tempt; make the vehicle look as if someone else beat the thief to the prize.

You can even make your vehicle repulsive to certain thieves by leaving a life-like, rubber tarantula or snake in full view on the front passenger seat or on the open door of the glove compartment. This advice may sound ridiculous, but even the most hardened criminal has his phobias. And besides, you'll get a kick out of knowing that you — whom most petty European thieves would take to be a fumbling, naive tourist — might be able to freak out one of these jerks.

On top of these tactics, you should take care to avoid a more much more rare type of thief, the type that's not deterred by the prospect of a confrontation with you. From Madrid comes a story about how such thieves might operate. The rental agencies at Madrid's airport park their vehicles in unprotected and unsupervised areas. This being so, thieves in Madrid have learned to puncture the tires of these vehicles, wait outside the parking area, follow the exiting vehicles, and rob them when the unsuspecting driver pulls over with a flat. Always be wary of roadside help offered by anyone other than a police officer or civil guard. If someone stops to help, ask them to contact the police for you. And conversely, don't you stop to help a stranded motorist: in the more marginal parts of Europe, roadside brigands are known to feign car trouble then rob you and/or steal your vehicle when you stop to help.

Undoubtedly you'll hear horror stories about driving in Italy. Try to evaluate the source. For example, on my first tour I met a family from Oregon who'd just finished driving in Italy; they resounded that driving in Rome was ridiculous chaos. Two days later, however, I met a couple from Manhattan who laughed and said driving in Rome was a breeze. Fewer deaths occur per million registered vehicles in Italy than per million registered vehicles in the United States. After driving extensively in Italy I'll say this: The cars move fast, but the streets in the cities are surprisingly wide, and the highways are fine. Italy, after all, is the home of the paved road. I'm from Iowa; I've had fun driving in Italy.

Although I want to abstain from giving specifics, there are at least two campgrounds in Italy that demand special mention. One of these is in Florence, immediately below and to the right of the Piazzale Michelangelo as you face the city from the Piazzale. The view from the Piazzale at sunset is unforgettable: the River Arno running from the grapey night, hugging the bluff's base, passing the silhouetted mountain that is Brunelleschi's magnificent dome, cutting through the city's plateau of desultory red roofs, suffering bridge after antique bridge, and, in a long French kiss with the dying day, taking on before the folded arms of the horizon's hills the glow of memory and promise … a tableau of time. The view from the campground is essentially the same. The other campground worth mentioning is across the lagoon from none other than Venice. Camp on the shore and look across to the glorious city. From the campground entrance take the regular boat service across the lagoon for a ten-minute approach to the city that'll have you pinching yourself, thinking that such things were reserved for movie stars.

If, on the other hand, you choose to park at Venice's huge Tronchetto garage, you may be met on approach by a man seeming to be an employee and who will direct you to the right side of the garage, away from the Vaporetto dock. He'll try to help you with your bags and usher you to a water taxi charging exhorbitant fares. If you balk he'll claim that the boat line you want is not in service. Just ignore these lowlifes and head to the left side of the garage for fairly priced parking and a cheap boat ride to the city center.

Looking to the east of Italy the question arises: How to do Greece by car? This is a good question. Currently, the best answer may be that you shouldn't. The problems in the former Yugoslavia make the most direct overland route to Greece very problematic, and traveling across the Adriatic accompanied by a vehicle means a costly ferry ride. Regardless, the myriad-island nature of Greece doesn't lend itself to driving. And the Greek roads are generally the worst in Europe. Perhaps as a direct result of these poor roads, Greece endures Europe's second highest incidence of motor-vehicle fatalities — and the worst accident rate in terms of the number of collisions per vehicle. Furthermore, the ports at Bari and Brindisi, Italy, are infamous for their thieves; think twice before you leave your vehicle at one of these ports.

But when will you have a better chance, right? You'll have a better chance if you fly in or return to London, where a return flight to Greece is cheap. Persons using train passes should consider doing Greece separately as well. Train travel in Greece is slow and frustrating; the bus system is much better. Note that by going to Greece later in the year, you can avoid the big crowds and the high prices that go with them. Furthermore, you can avoid the uncomfortably hot days and nights. May is considered the best month in which to visit Greece. By October the rains return — but only one day a week on average. And averaging 60° Fahrenheit, nights are cooler and more comfortable in May and October (on average, 12° Fahrenheit cooler than July and August, 6° Fahrenheit cooler than June and September). Ferries serve some Greek islands on a daily basis and some on a weekly basis. If you want to maintain maximum flexibility in your travel plans, consider traveling only to those islands that the ferries serve daily.

You can travel to Turkey by motor vehicle via the Istanbul route — an expressway bypasses the city — or by ferry. Note that Turkey's train system is quite bad; buses there offer much more timely and extensive service and cost a few dollars per hour. Perhaps the bus travel is so good because Turkey's roads are surprisingly good; don't hesitate to drive in Turkey.

I mentioned earlier that theft of vehicles is not a problem in Western Europe, but this is not the case in Poland, for example. Poland suffers (or benefits, you might say) from a very high rate of theft of western vehicles, which, once swiped, are taken to Russia and sold. (In Poland the taxis are not Mercedes!) The same is true for Prague, in the Czech Republic, and for the Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. In these places consider parking near a train station in outlying areas or towns that tourists don't frequent. Thieves hang out where the tourists hang out. You can take one of the frequent trains (there's usually one every hour) into the major metro areas, where you don't need a vehicle anyway. The ride will cost just a few dollars. I once left my car for four days near the train station in Plzen, the birthplace of pilsner beer and the home of the world-famous Pilsner Urquell brew. From there I took a 3 train ride the remaining one hundred miles into Prague. To read the train schedules, however, you should know that in Slavic languages like Czech and Polish the preposition Do, do, or go, pronounced "doe," means to (literally, until), as in "departing to"; while the preposition om, pronounced "ott," means from, as in "arriving from." There's a good chance, however, that thieves won't rip-off your vehicle if you drive into the major metropolitan areas of these countries — especially if it's ugly and you're careful. Of course a deterrent such as "The Club" or an installed kill switch (standard now on many new European-version vehicles) will help, as will turning your wheels all the way to the curb and engaging the steering-wheel lock.

If you plan to drive a BMW or the like, you may be justified in fearing the criminals of Southern and Eastern Europe. As such, one compromise option to consider in the initial stages of planning your journey is the following: take the trains in Southern and Eastern Europe and drive in northwest Europe. Not only is crime more prevalent in Southern and Eastern Europe, but the train tickets are much cheaper there as well. To take advantage of such price gradients, you'd have to buy point-to-point train tickets or single-country passes instead of inter-country passes. Besides the issues of crime and rail fares, there's the issue of language. The populations of Southern and Eastern Europe do not speak English with anywhere near the frequency or skill as do the populations of Europe's northwest. In the northwest you can realize the full potential of your motor vehicle by getting out to meet and actually converse with the people who don't see tourists very often. I've already mentioned that it's better to buy a vehicle in the northwest. Well, if you do buy, staying in that region with the vehicle will keep your fuel costs down, and if any problems arise — and they are less likely to arise in the more temperate, industrialized and Anglicized northwest — you can deal with them much easier. Defining the limits of your itinerary on a more geological basis, however, may be the best approach. Here's an idea: Don't drive south of the great mountain ranges (the Alps and the Pyrénées) or east of the former Iron Curtain. You'll want the motor vehicle in the mountains, however, to propel you up into beautiful scenery and hard-to-get-at hideaways.

The criminal, economic, and cultural issues which prompt consideration of the above compromises are complex and generally not weighty. I don't want to give the impression that enough circumstances, dangerous or otherwise, exist to justify a broad recommendation of these compromises. On the contrary, I recommend that you resist, in spirit at least, such compromises, for they are based largely on fear and fear alone — and fear is usually overblown and much more likely to sabotage your trip than are criminal elements or monetary or cultural constraints.

There's another grand plan which combines train and motor vehicle travel, a plan which is not basically a compromise and which does arise from weighty issues. Because a motor vehicle is usually a liability in major cities, you may want to use the high-speed trains to dart disjointedly to the major cities you wish to see, doing this either before you get a motor vehicle or after you return one. You can use the motor vehicle to explore the smaller towns and the countryside. This way you'll experience all the major facets of the European travel infrastructure and subculture, avoiding the most negative aspects of each while exploiting the most positive. The one drawback to this plan is the unbalanced nature of the itinerary — a continuous series of cities followed by a continuous series of small towns and countrysides. Although I hesitate to call such series monotonous, they may not constitute the proper balance for you. You can be flexible, however, using the train to go to some smaller towns or countryside stops and using the motor vehicle to make an occasional excursion into a larger town or city. You may also want to combine this plan with the compromise of taking trains in Southern and Eastern Europe and driving in northwest Europe.

Moving north we come to the land of my forebears: Scandinavia Norway's cost of living is the highest in Europe — you'll pay 50 a night for a bed in an Oslo or Bergen hostel. Surprisingly, however, I've spent less money per day there than in any of the other countries I've visited. Why the paradox? Norway, Sweden and Finland sanction or tolerate camping on just about any unfenced land — even if private — as long as you're 100 meters (about 100 yards) from any dwellings, stay no more than two nights, and pick up after yourself. The long summer days in Scandinavia make camping there easier still. Bring a good sleeping bag though: it can get cold. I've spent three-fourths of my Norwegian nights free-camping.

Sounds like a lot of camping, I know. But Norway's scenery is truly incredible, especially her fjord country — maybe the world's most salient precinct of the possible. And the civilization is ideally and wonderfully integrated: In Norway you always feel close to nature, but never far from civilization. If you do go to Norway, be sure to visit Oslo's Frogner Park. Over 150 granite and bronze statues sculpted over some thirty years by Gustav Vigeland stand in the park — the most remarkable collection of sculpture in Europe, in my opinion. Admittance to the park is free of charge.

Late spring or early summer is the best time to visit Scandinavia. The longest days occur in late June, when it's light until midnight. There is snow in the summer, high atop the fjords. In fact, you can ski in the summer near Stryn, Norway, about six hours by car northwest of Oslo.

Of course you'll have to end your motoring tour in a city or town. Note that Paris makes a good transition point. Paris is one of the best places in the world in which to hangout without a vehicle.

Several factors coincide to make London the best place in which to transition or conclude a grand tour. First, you'll make many Aussie and Kiwi friends while traveling on the continent. Most of these folks base their travels out of Britain — London especially — where they've come to spend a couple of years. Late in the summer they tend to return to Britain to work and pay for their summer fun. As such, you can travel the Isles with these temporary Brits or stay at their place and avoid the high costs of London's accommodations. And it's likely that after showing this book to these notoriously high-spirited travelers, you can persuade them to chip in and help you buy a motor vehicle in which you can then travel the Isles together. The market will be a buyer's in late summer. Second, London is the home of the cheap flight. Off season you can fly from London most anywhere very cheaply. Third, your command of the local language will allow you to make complicated arrangements for extensions to your trip. If you do plan an extension to your trip, stop in Stanford's Travel Bookshop, 12 Long Acre, London: they claim to offer the largest selection of travel literature in the world. Fourth, note that in the beginning stages of a trip you'll be psyched to try other languages, but by the end you'll pang for good 'ol English. Finally, a special note for budget travelers on a serious budget: unlike those on the continent, most hostels in Britain and Ireland take Visa and MasterCard, so if you're running low on funds, you can finance more of your traveling with a credit card.

Also contributing to the above argument are three factors which make Britain an outstanding bookend to a grand tour — whether it stands at the beginning or the end. First, Britain does not honor Eurailpasses but it does offer many exciting alternatives. Second, the English Channel and Britain's left-side driving convention tend to make transporting a vehicle between Britain and the continent an unwise venture. Finally there's the weather. Rain falls in the Britain and Ireland an average of two to three times a week all year round. Don't get too cute and go to Britain or Ireland with sun and warmth figured into your plan; sun and warmth are not why you go there. Although the waters that surround the isles buffer them from grand climate changes, this just succeeds in making the weather consistently blah. But you can work the isles' blahness to your advantage by realizing that most people equate high temperatures with good weather and good times. The vast majority of people visit the Isles in July and August when the temperature is highest. But what's this? It rains much more in July and August than it does earlier in the year. And in the South of England and in Ireland it also rains less in September and October than it does in July and August. A tour bus operator in Killarney, Ireland, told me that in July and August up to 150 tour buses work the Kerry Peninsula; while in October there are only five or so a day. He also noted the fortuitous nature of the colder temperatures: the days tend to be clearer after the night frosts. Of course, the lower temperatures and smaller crowds mean lower prices and fewer hassles as well. Strongly consider combining the world-famous Edinburgh Festival — held from mid August to early September — with a September and October tour of the Isles, but make your reservations in the spring for accommodation in Edinburgh during the festival. As for spring around Britain, you'll love England and Holland in late April and May if you're into flowers. Note also that June is considered the best month — weather-wise — in which to visit Britain. September/October seems to be festival time in Ireland:

Here are some other major European festivals and happenings.

Documents

Many countries require of you, the foreign driver, no license apart from your domestic driver's license. However, certain countries require of certain non-resident driver's an international driver's license (IDL), otherwise known as an international driving permit (IDP), in addition. You should contact the relevant tourist office, consulate or embassy to determine whether a country requires you to carry an IDL while driving. A good secondary reference in this respect is the UK's AA. Basically an IDL is a means by which police in a foreign country can know — in terms of translations in nearly a dozen different languages — that your domestic driver's license is indeed recognized as being valid by the proper authorities in your country. (See the excellent article at Drivers.com.)

The local office of your auto club (AAA, CAA, etc.) sells IDLs for about US$20. If you need an IDL, take your license, two passport-sized photos and the requisite cash to the club office. (Though for about US$6 the club may snap Polaroid photos for you.) Ten minutes later you'll be able to legally drive on any European road — assuming you're at least 18 years of age. If you plan to operate a motorcycle in Europe, be sure to have the auto club certify your qualification to do so. The USA's AAA now has a Webpage whereby drivers licensed in the USA can obtain an IDL: AAA's application for IDL. Web searches will bring up a host of websites selling documents that conform to the model delineated in annex 10 of the United Nations Convention on Road Traffic (1949); but according to Article 24 of that convention, a truly valid IDL is one which is "issued .. by the competent authority of another Contracting State or subdivision thereof, or by an association duly empowered by such authority ...." The US State Department says it has empowered only the American Automobile Association (AAA) and the American Automobile Touring Alliance (AATA) to issue IDLs. (The AATA offers IDLs through the National Automobile Club.)

The right to drive in European Union (EU) countries is based largely on the possession of a driver's license issued to a person living permanently in a country that has ratified the Geneva or Vienna convention agreements on road traffic. Australia, Brazil, Canada, Israel, New Zealand, South Africa, the USA, and many other countries — including Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan (Republic of China, ROC), Singapore and South Korea — have ratified one or both of the aforementioned traffic agreements.

Most European countries — notable exceptions being Austria, Italy and Spain — do not also require an international driver's license (IDL, IDP) of persons who hold a driver's license from such ratifying countries. However, if there is no English in such license, a notarized translation or else an IDL is typically required.

Vehicle rental companies, in relation to the motoring insurance they offer, may and often do impose driver's license requirements that are different than those imposed by the relevant government. For instance, such company might not require an IDL in a country that does require an IDL; or they might require an IDL in a country that does not require an IDL.

China (People's Republic of China, PRC) has ratified neither of the aforementioned convention agreements on road traffic. Therefore a proper IDL cannot be obtained in relation to a China (PRC) driver's license. Morever, in Finland and Sweden a China (PRC) driver's license cannot be used as a basis for driving legally. In Norway and most if not all of the rest of Europe, on the other hand, a China (PRC) driver's license is sufficient if the license includes English translation or is accompanied by a notarized translation of the license into English. A holder of a China (PRC) license should contact the relevant consulates to determine whether the nation in which s/he plans to drive accepts their license as a legal basis for driving.

The following countries in Europe require that vehicles using certain of the nation's roads bear a special one-off road tax sticker or vignette: Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Latvia, Moldova, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Switzerland. Switzerland requires such vignette on its expressways. You can buy the Swiss vignette for 40 SwF at Swiss National Tourist offices, Swiss Customs posts (the border), Swiss post offices, or Swiss garages. (However, check whether your rental vehicle already has a valid vignette on it from a previous renter, in which case you don't need another vignette.) At the border you can pay in SwF, EUR £'s and USD. You can also pay inside the Customs office onsite by credit card. The vignette is valid until the end of the January of the year after you buy it, is non transferable, and should be thoroughly affixed to the windshield. If you buy it from the person stationed for this purpose outside the office (who accepts only cash), they will insist on affixing the sticker. If you buy inside the office you can affix the sticker yourself. You must obtain a separate vignette for a trailer or caravan. If your vehicle doesn't bear a properly affixed vignette and the Swiss police catch you driving on an expressway, you'll be subject to a 100 SwF fine — on top of the vignette's cost. Expressways offer the only hope for speedy and level motor travel through mountainous Switzerland. Still, it's not absolutely necessary to use the expressways there; I abstained on one trip. You have to ask yourself this: Why do I want to travel quickly and horizontally through Switzerland? Carefully study your map to determine if you want a vignette. See Wikipedia's Vignette page for more about such vignettes and road taxes.

Never leave the ownership papers (called a "Grey Card") or the insurance papers alone in the vehicle. In fact, you should make photocopies of these papers and of your domestic driver's license and IDP and then stash them in the same safe place (a neck pouch or money belt, for example) you keep the copies of your passport and birth certificate. If you're missing one of these documents when police pull you over, you'll be fined on the spot.

If you'll be driving someone else's vehicle, you should get written permission from the owner. In Portugal, however, you must obtain an Autorizacao certificate also; to get one, contact your local motoring club or a Portuguese tourist office or embassy, or stop in a European vehicle-registration office. Again, make and stash photocopies of these documents.

Health and Security

Buying travel insurance is the closest thing to buying a guarantee for a hassle-free trip. Such coverage can include personal liability, personal accident, hospital benefit, medical expenses, evacuation, money loss, baggage loss or damage, travel delay or interruption, cancellation, legal expenses, and loss of passport expenses. A friend of mine took ill on her trip and spent ten days in a British hospital; besides the fact that her regular health insurance covered the bills, she got about US$150 a day from her travel insurance. Of course you must determine for yourself if the risks justify the costs.

Beware of package travel insurance plans that span health, baggage, autos and the like: they usually duplicate insurance that you already have and contain too many exclusions. Check if your current health care covers you abroad, and bring along any medical insurance claim forms you may need. Also check how your credit cards may cover you. Baggage insurance benefits for lost or stolen articles tend to be lousy — covering up to, say, US$1000 only and excluding items like cameras, jewelry and currency. Airlines may automatically cover each passenger's luggage to a similar degree. Motor vehicle rental and leasing companies also offer baggage insurance. As such, develop a list of the areas in which you are now not adequately covered. Next, call the travel insurance companies I list below. Determine if these companies can offer a piecemeal, customized package. I recommend that you consider purchasing the insurance from a company that's underwritten by an insurance company in your home country: this will ease the settling of any claims when you return home and, sorry to add, will cover the costs of transporting your body home if you meet your end abroad. Regardless, determine (1) if you're covered for personal effects left unattended in a locked motor vehicle (specify if you'll be traveling in a camper van), (2) the maximum coverage of any single article, and (3) if sports activities such as skiing or hang-gliding are covered.

The International Travelers Hotline of the United States Centers for Disease Control will tell you what inoculations you may need for a particular destination. Consider bringing a record of all your inoculations in case you decide to continue on to less developed areas of the world.

Bring your eyeglasses prescription; it's possible you'll lose your glasses.

Hostellers and/or Students

To stay in hostels that are affiliated with the Hostelling International (HI) organization, you should have an HI membership card.

The International Student Identification Card (ISIC) entitles students under 26 years of age to big discounts on everything from museum entry to ferry passage; it may also provide limited travel insurance. Be sure to get this card if you qualify.

Miscellaneous

Campers should consider getting a Camping Card Internationale (CCI)sponsored by the FIA, the AIT and the International Federation of Camping and Caravaning (FICC) and commonly called a "Camping Carnet". Some campgrounds require that one CCI per campsite be deposited with the office. Some demand either a CCI or a passport. (Though you should carry your passport with you at all times.) For campground managers, the CCI amounts to a guarantee of payment: if you damage anything and/or leave without paying, the campground will turn in your card and eventually receive compensation. For you, the Carnet provides several million SwF worth of insurance against any damages you might accidentally cause to the campground; and in some cases it entitles you to discounts.

If you'll be hostelling, camping, or staying with families or friends, consider bringing some of your favorite recipes, or researching recipes that are representative of the areas you'll be traveling to.

If bicycling, write down the make, model, and serial number of the bicycle.

Driving Across Borders In Europe

Until recently vehicles attempting to drive across a European national border were required to bear near the rear license plate a regulation nationality sticker designating the country in which the vehicle was registered. This is no longer a requirement.

As I described in the Why Drive? chapter, in most cases border-crossing is a quick and hassle-free process. Although potentially you're subject to passport checks and searches of your person and vehicle upon crossing a border, often you can zip across the borders of Northern European countries without even slowing down. Most countries in western Europe have signed the so called Schengen treaty, leading to open borders. Crossing a border from one Schengen country to another Schengen country is usually like crossing from one U.S. state to another. For instance, when driving from Germany to the Netherlands the border is signified only with a blue square sign bearing the European Union circle of yellow stars around "Nederland" in white characters. No border check point. Even Switzerland, which is not a member of the European Union has signed the Schengen treaty and has open borders. In other cases where border check points are still in place, you'll likely be required to slow down and stop before the guards simply wave you through. A circular sign reading "Douane Zoll" is a signal that you must stop. If you do encounter a border check point, most likely you'll just queue-up in your vehicle, wait a minute or two, hand each passenger's passport to the guard when you reach the station, flash a smile, wait a moment until the guard returns the passports, and proceed forward a couple hundred meters to the border check point of the next country (where you'll repeat the process). Sometimes the guards will want to see your vehicle's registration and proof of insurance. Sometimes, even, your vehicle will be searched. If you're chosen for a search, follow the Customs officers' directions and chalk it all up to experience; it's not too time consuming or nerve-wracking — unless, of course, you've got illegal substances or items with you. It goes without saying that you should never bring illicit drugs or weapons across borders. If you're transporting hitchhikers or others who haven't had the opportunity to gain your trust, politely and up front make it known to them that they must get out at the border and lug their things across on foot. If your vehicle has significant cosmetic damage to it, point it out to the Customs officials and have them note it on your passport; otherwise upon exiting the country you might be suspected of having been in an accident in that country and fleeing your associated responsibilities. If a country requires you to declare your vehicle with Customs, you'll probably be obliged to pay customs duty and tax if you leave the country without the vehicle.

Here's a trick to be aware of. If several fuel stations are clustered on your side of a border, fuel is probably more expensive in the next country; fill up before crossing.

The auto clubs of many countries maintain offices at the borders. These offices may sell everything from auto insurance to maps to guidebooks.

Finally, note that many border crossings close overnight, from, say, 8:00 or 9:00 p.m. to 7:00 or 8:00 a.m.; but most stay open until 10:00, 11:00, or 12:00 p.m. in the summer.

Fuel In Europe

In many countries the price of diesel is about 20 percent less than that of gasoline. However in some countries this difference is much smaller, and in a few countries — namely Latvia, Slovakia, Switzerland and the UK — diesel tends to be slightly more expensive than gasoline.... Nevertheless, diesel engines are about 25 percent more efficient than gasoline engines. Therefore in most countries you end up saving some 30–40 percent on your fuel costs if you drive a diesel rather than a gasoline-powered vehicle. Diesels run smoother once they are up to speed, and they perform better in the mountains. Though not naturally as powerful (i.e. capable of accelerating) as gasoline engines, many diesels are boosted by turbo chargers to make up much of this difference. Environmentally, diesel engines are superior in some important respects, inferior in others. All told, diesel engines are now just slightly less harmful to the environment than are gasoline-powered engines. Sure diesel smells; but gasoline smells, too! Over half the new cars sold in Europe are now diesel; and high-quality diesel fuel is of course available wherever gasoline is sold, the pumps being on the same service islands as the gasoline pumps. Some stations even provide disposable gloves which customers may don to pump fuel. Make sure you do not mistakenly pull up to a truck diesel pump. The size of the nozzles for the truck pumps versus the car pumps is different. A truck fuel nozzle is too big to fit into a car's diesel fuel pipe, and the flow rate is much greater. LPG (i.e. propane) pumps always occupy their own island.

A diesel nozzle is considerably wider than either a leaded gasoline nozzle or the even smaller unleaded gasoline nozzle and indeed will not fit into either such tank. Consequently a gasoline nozzle will fit into a diesel tank. Therefore, be careful not to put gasoline into a diesel tank. Even a liter of gasoline added to the tank of a modern diesel car can cause irreversible damage to the injection pump and other components due to its relatively low lubricity. In some cases, the diesel car so abused has to be scrapped because the cost of repairs exceeds its value. (Diesel in a gasoline engine — while creating large amounts of smoke — does not normally cause permanent damage if it is drained once the mistake is realized. Similarly, older diesels using completely mechanical injection can tolerate some gasoline, which has historically been used to "thin" diesel fuel in winter.) A green pump holds unleaded gasoline or else diesel, a blue leaded gasoline. Diesel pumps are sometimes colored black, sometimes green. Diesel pumps are chiefly signified linguistically, either with the very word diesel or with one of the equivalents: gas-oil, gaz-oil, gasolio, gasóleo, dieselolie, mazot, motorina, or nafta.

Visit Ireland's AA page or the Tolls.eu/fuel-prices webpage for up-to-date listings of fuel prices. (Remember: 1 US Gallon = 3.79 Liters.)

Note how cheap fuel typically is in Andorra and Luxembourg relative to surrounding countries; how it's much cheaper in Spain than in France; how it's more expensive in Switzerland; how it's much cheaper in Ireland than in the UK; and how it gets progressively more expensive from Germany to Denmark to Sweden to Norway. Fuel in Andorra is typically much cheaper than fuel in either Spain or France.

Fuel is much more expensive at stations along the expressways. Supermarkets along main roads at the edges of towns sell the cheapest fuel in France, Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands. In France the main supermarket chains are Mammoth and Intermarche; in Germany the main chain is Spar; in the Netherlands it's Mamoet. The governments of Italy and Spain and Eastern Europe regulate fuel prices; all stations have the same price, so don't waste your time shopping for fuel in these countries.

Pump your own fuel or habitually check that the attendant doesn't cheat you. (Make sure he zeroes the pump before he pumps your fuel.) If you pay with a credit card, make sure the receipt is accurate. Some stations require that you pay not inside at a counter but outside at a booth upon driving out of the station area. (Although increasingly you can pay by inserting a credit card in a machine near the pumps.) If this is the case and a line of vehicles forms at the pay booth, you may have to wait to pump your fuel until the person who preceded you at the pump pays for theirs. Especially when dealing with such setups, note the total fuel charge on the pump so the attendant at the booth can't overcharge you; sometimes the attendants depend on your honesty and let you quote the total to them at the booth. In hot weather, fill up early in the morning or late in the evening when the air is cooler: the fuel will be more dense then, and thus you'll get more fuel for your Euro (or whatever).

You might make it a practice to fill up when the fuel level dips to a quarter of a tank, but fuel stations are so plentiful that the chances of unexpectedly finding yourself low on fuel and far from a station are very low. If, however, you're careless enough to come close to running out of fuel, try the following technique: accelerate very slowly to 33 kph; turn off the ignition and move the gear to neutral; let the vehicle slow to 8 kph; start the engine; and repeat. This trick can double or even triple fuel efficiency; but it's a trick that won't work if your steering wheel locks when the ignition is off, and it can be dangerous and illegal.

European Roadsigns And Signals

The STOP sign ever so familiar to North Americans is used throughout continental Europe and the world — and it even reads "STOP" in English. (In the UK, however, the ubiquitous roundabout obviates the need for widespread use of the STOP sign.) The world also uses the same Yield sign as North America. The Red light = stop, green light = go convention is used everywhere as well. A solid or flashing amber light precedes the red light and green light in most areas. This light signals that a red or green light is imminent. If you have the option to eventually turn right (or left in Britain or Ireland) at a stop, a green arrow that points right may light simultaneously with the main red light that's stopping traffic from moving straight ahead. This green arrow means you can make a yielding right turn. Turning right when both these lights show red is against the law. In other words, no right turn on red. A protected left turn is indicated only when on the left side of the intersection a green signal arrow points left; a green arrow pointing left on the right side of the intersection signals a yielding left turn is permitted. In many areas traffic signals are turned off or flash yellow at night. Usually in such cases signs are in place next to the signals and these then control the situation. While fully operating, however, traffic signals override signs.

The same set of standardized road signs are used all over Europe. These signs are essentially graphic rather than linguistic in nature. As such, their meaning tends to be easy to understand. Of course the meaning of some signs is less obvious than the meaning of others. On the International Roadsigns subpage I've placed images of the more important and confusing signs. (I do this separately so you don't have to sit through their download every time you access this chapter.) Diamond signs indicate priority. Red triangles are warnings. Red circles are restrictions. Blue circles are requirements. Squares and rectangles give guidance. Note the signs which show two arrows pointing in opposite directions. If one of these arrows is red, it means the traffic traveling in that direction must yield to traffic traveling in the other direction. The color red on a European road sign signals negative information such as a warning or prohibition. For another instance check out the sign that means No bicycles. You may encounter a similar circular sign showing a bicycle on a blue background. This sign designates a bicycle path. As used on the road signs the color blue is positive in that it signals an obligatory action or some feature — such as a bicycle lane, a rest stop or a parking garage — that you can take advantage of; simply put it says do rather than don't.

A level train crossing without barriers is indicated by the three subseqeunt triangle signs atop a diagonally hashed post. The first sign in the sequence bears three red diagonal hashes representing the three multiples of 80 meters (240 meters) remaining until the crossing. The other two are set at 80 meter intervals approaching the crossing and as such bear two hashes and one hash, respectively. A flashing red beacon and/or continuous bell warns of an approaching train. When the way is clear, the beacon changes to white or amber, and/or the bell ceases. You must turn off your vehicle's headlights when waiting at a crossing.

As in North America, dashed center lines mark passing zones while solid center lines denote no-passing zones. But while in North America yellow markings separate opposing traffic flows and white lines separate traffic moving in the same direction, in Europe white lines are used in both cases. Sometimes painted in regular succession amidst the dashed lines are fat arrows which curve slightly and point toward one lane while otherwise pointing almost straight ahead in the direction of that same lane. These arrows tell vehicles traveling in that lane that their passing zone will soon come to an end. A thick white orthogonal line at an intersection indicates where you must stop when you are in fact required to stop; a thinner dashed version indicates where you must yield when in fact you must yield. Diagonal white lines filling a space outlined in white indicate a portion of the street where vehicles are prohibited.

In road construction areas on most highways and superhighways the left lane is usually limited to a vehicle width of 2 meters or less (indicated by signs). If a driver (of a motorhome, say) ignores that limitation and uses said lane, he/she may be liable for any consequent damages. Usually such damages to the vehicle itself would not be covered by the collision damage insurance attaching to the vehicle whereas the damages to third-party property (at least outside the vehicle) would be covered by the third party liability insurance attaching to the vehicle. Similarly, some road toll plazas (in Italy and France especially) have certain lanes for passenger cars only; there are signs indicating the maximum width; if a driver ignore those signs, the driver is liable for consequent damages.

Cities usually post street signs not on poles at the corners but on placards attached one story up on buildings. Note that street names in some areas are apt to change frequently along an otherwise continuous avenue of concrete, and main routes may go unsigned while the intersecting and relatively minor cross streets are fastidiously labeled.

Driving In Europe

You should familiarize yourself with and try to adhere to the rules of the road of each country, but don't sacrifice the proper state of mind in the process. Ironically, I think the best way to nurture the right attitude is to tone down your dependence on memory, to let the environmental stimuli flow into you unimpeded by too many worries, to react naturally and to trust your reactions, to make mistakes and to not dwell on them, to throw off the great weight of fastidiousness, to exercise the old adage: When in Rome, do as the Romans do. In other words, go with the flow; be cool; blend in with traffic; and revel in the fact that you're truly participating in a different culture, that you've effectively become, for a short time at least, a citizen of Europe. When in Paris do as the Parisians and park on the sidewalk. When in Scandinavia, if you notice everybody else driving with their lights on — even in bright sun — you'd better too. It's easy.

OK, but now you're on the road in, say, France, and you think you may be on the wrong road. You're getting nervous because you want to stay off the toll roads. Blue signs marked with the letter "A" indicate Autoroute péage (toll) roads; while green signs with the letter "N" indicate non-toll Route National highways. No problem: just follow the signs in green, the signs that indicate the non-toll highways. At times, you'll note, the signals seem ambiguous because one sign bears both blue and green sections listing A and N roads respectively. "How can I be on both an A and an N road at the same time?" you'll ask yourself. Such signage means only that you're on your way to both types of road, that the road you're on is not a toll road; eventually you'll have the option to enter either the toll road or a non-toll road. Sometimes after following a green-only or a blue/green sign, a blue-only sign will appear unaccompanied by possible turnoffs. Don't worry: eventually another green sign will direct you to a non-toll road before you have to pay. This all sounds simple, and it is. Just keep following the last sign you saw. Keep following the last sign you saw. Keep following the last sign you saw . . . Sorry, but I feel the redundancy is justified. It's easy to get flustered and worry that you missed an important turn. But the keen state of mind that you'll be in, coupled with the excellent nature of the roads and signage, will render quite small the chances of actually missing such a turnoff. Be astute, but trust yourself and the road design and signage. In a word, relax; usually it all comes together in the end. The wisdom of this simple approach has been apparent to me time after time throughout my travels. I've slowly learned not to get flustered when there isn't a meaningful sign placed every one kilometer. This is more than a prudent approach to driving; it's an attitude, an attitude that will greatly increase the pleasure you draw from your trip. You are, after all, on the road; you should be singing songs and talking like Kerouac.

And, as I first described in the Why Drive? chapter, history has assured that navigating to the cities and towns and sights is much more of a song than you might expect. First, most of the European languages you'll encounter are cognate with English; so it tends to be quite easy to read signs which give directions. What's more, each city and town grew from an old town center. In this center, of course, lie most of a town's attractive sites and accommodations. Everything falls into place if you follow the ubiquitous signs to the town center or simply head toward the tallest church spire. Most of the signs denoting town centers bear variations of the word center, such as "Centro," "Centrum," "Centre Ville," "Centro Città," or "Zentrum"; in many parts of Germany the word is "Stadtmitte." Furthermore, on the way to the center of town you'll see tourist information boards or signs indicating the direction to the tourist office. Most such signs read "i" for information; in France, however, they read "Office du Tourisme" or "Syndicat d'Initiative"; in the Netherlands they read "VVV"; sometimes they bear a lone "?."

Another way to get your bearings when entering a town is to follow the signs that point to the train station. Both the signs and the stations they point to are ubiquitous in Europe. Look for signs reading "Gare," "Estacion," or some variation of the word station. Many guidebooks use the train station as the origin for their directions to sights and accommodations. Furthermore, the famous and (here we go again) ubiquitous Hostelling International sign (see it above) tends to be nearby, pointing the way to the nearest hostel. In most cases hostel proprietors have placed these signs in a series and with a frequency designed to lead all but the most clueless along the best route to the hostel door. Often, a tourist office operates out of the local train station. At the very least you'll find city maps dispensed inside or a single city map displayed on a large public board just outside. Perhaps what's more important, many of your fellow travelers at the station will be more than happy to give you the scoop on the best places to stay, the best sights, and the best places to hang out. Moreover, the parking lot will be at your disposal — often free of charge: you can just leave your vehicle in the lot and continue on foot or by metro, bus, or taxi. Since governments tend to build train stations near places of interest and since business people who cater to travelers tend to locate their establishments around either train stations or places of interest, you probably won't feel compelled to stray too far from the station.

To leave a city either follow the signs that indicate the road or the city you want to travel on or to or follow the signs that bear words meaning "all directions" or "other directions". You'll note when checking the expressways on your map that they often have two different numbers designating them. One is the national designation and the other — with the "E" prefix — is the Europe-wide designation, which simply provides for continuous numbering between countries.

European police don't seem to enforce speed limits with the same gusto as do North American police. The fast lane is usually just that — fast. The countries hungriest for speed are Germany and Great Britain, where fast-lane speeds of 120 mph (200 km/h) and 85 mph (142 km/h), respectively, are common. As I'm sure you've heard, no speed limit exists on many sections of the famous German Autobahnen. In contrast to Germany and Britain, traffic in Norway seems to crawl along. Generally, traffic flows about 10 mph (17 km/h) faster than traffic in North America. The roads are good enough to handle the high speeds, but if you don't fancy yourself a Euro Speed Racer or if your vehicle simply can't keep up, you won't be alone: plenty of Europeans drive 55 mph in the slow lanes or amicably signal or pull onto the shoulder so speedier drivers can pass. Many countries define speed limits in terms of "built-up" areas. A built-up area is indicated by a sign, placed along the road at the community boundary, that bears the name of the community. The end of a built-up area is indicated by a black slash across a twin of this sign. If when outside a built-up area the police nail you for speeding, they won't pull you over immediately; instead, they'll radio one of their colleagues who'll pull you over at a convenient spot down the road.

You need to familiarize yourself with the ways drivers may signal to you. If someone driving in the opposite direction blinks their vehicle's headlights, it means that police are lying in wait ahead. On the open roads someone who wants to pass may come up behind you with their vehicle's left blinker (right blinker where driving driving is on the left) and/or headlights flashing (if on the continent); if you're on a single-lane highway, signal with your vehicle's right directional (left directional where driving is on the left) when you think it's safe for them to pass. European truckers use the same blinker signal to let you know it's safe to pass them. If the truck driver sees danger ahead he'll engage his truck's left blinker (right blinker where driving is on the left). Two quick beeps on the horn means "Thank you." Although I cannot recommend you interpret such signals as I describe above, you may soon come to trust them. In any case, if you act on these signals and my description of them, you do so at your own risk. Indeed, in Germany the flashing of headlights to indicate a desire or determination to pass is forbidden and may even lead to prosecution. Similarly in the British Isles it a good idea to flash your headlights to indicate you want to pass, as this is likely to offend the driver ahead of you; better just express a sense of urgency by using your indicator and hovering significantly near behind the vehicle and somewhat toward the center of the road — but without tailgaiting. Throughout Europe you're expected to sound your horn before taking a blind curve on a narrow rural or mountain road. Otherwise, use the horn as a last resort. Motorcyclists often signal their Hello's to other bikers and Thank you's to other motorists (earned for instance by a car that moves over to give more room for the cycle to pass) by slowly pressing out their right leg.

You'll encounter tunnels in mountainous areas. Be sure to turn on your vehicle's headlights before entering a tunnel; police tend to lie in wait on the other end, nailing driver's who haven't lit up. Norway's tunnels are so long they're unnerving; you'll feel like Starbuck being shot out of the Battlestar Galactica, and you'll think to yourself, "Gee, even Superman woulda had a hard time digging these tunnels."

By the way, driving with headlights on decreases by 30 percent your chances of being in a collision with another vehicle — that's why it's required at all times in Scandinavia. And police are bound to go easier on drivers thoughtful enough to light up.

Tolls are typically charged for using the larger tunnels in Europe. Moreover, France, Italy, Portugal and Spain have extensive toll road systems on their expressways; Belgium, Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands, on the other hand, do not. For details on all the various road toll systems and instances in Europe, please see the Tolls.eu webpage.

To use toll roads, you must, upon entering the system, pay at a booth or else get a ticket by pushing a red button on a driver's-side ticketing machine. Sometimes the ticketing machine controls a barrier; other times there's no barrier. If you go through an unbarred control point without getting a ticket, you'll be charged the maximum toll at the next exit. So they can further prosecute violators, many toll stations use automatic cameras to photograph any vehicle that passes through a pay booth without paying.

If you travel through mountain tunnels or over passes which charge a toll, note that many offer discounted return fares for travelers who'll return within a certain period, usually 72 hours.

Where two roads of equal priority intersect, you must give way to traffic coming from your right. In France this rule once applied to all roads, thus supplanting any notion of a priority road; fortunately this is no longer the case. These days long stretches of European roadway are clearly marked as priority roads, and/or the approaches to and intersections with priority roads are clearly marked with warning signs and with Yield and STOP signs or signals. Since they don't really intersect with other roads, all expressways (variously called autoroutes, autobahns, motorways, etc.) have priority. In towns a priority road often branches and makes complicated turns. In such cases a sign often identifies the priority road with a fat line opposed to thin lines which indicate lesser roads. Only on occasion will two roads of equal (unmarked) priority intersect and oblige you to exercise your knowledge of what in France is called "priorité à droite" or "priority on the right". Sometimes this runs rather counter to intuition. Take the case of an uncontrolled "T" intersection of two equal roads. You might think traffic on the through street of the "T" would have priority. But, no, traffic on the right must be yielded to. (Left-turning vehicles, however, should always yield in this situation.)

"Hey, look kids. There's Big Ben, and there's Parliament," exclaims driver Chevy Chase — starring as Clark Griswald, the well-meaning but bumbling patriarch of the pathetic Griswald clan — in a scene from the 1985 movie European Vacation. The scene unfolds early one day in the family's rented car as Clark attempts to navigate a London roundabout. "Kids. Big Ben, Parliament, (again)," he repeats the second time around. "Kids." "We know," they retort in unison. ". . . Big Ben, Parliament." Dusk finds the Griswald's little car circling on the same roundabout, all passengers but Clark fast asleep. "It's amazing," Clark says to himself in hysterical disbelief. "I cannot get left."

Roundabouts: those circular intersections where stop signs are nonexistent, and everyone's at everyone else's mercy, and you have to join the flow if you want to go — and you could, in theory, go around forever. The word roundabout is actually of American origin. American Logan Pearsall Smith, one of the members in the 1920s of the BBC Advisory Committee on Spoken English originated it. Before he suggested the change, traffic circles in Britain were called gyratory circuses. (Smith also wanted to call traffic lights stop-and-goes.) To many of us North Americans, though, roundabouts epitomize European motoring. The popular American imagination elevates few elements of civil engineering to the level of enigma, but it has done so with roundabouts. In fact many non Europeans assume that if roundabouts are such a puzzle, so must be the rest of European car and motorhome travel. You know by now that this assumption is unsound. But what is the deal with roundabouts anyway? Although in most cases you don't need to stop when entering a roundabout, you must yield to traffic that's already on it. A sign bearing a circle of three counterclockwise arrows indicates such a roundabout. Though increasingly rare, some roundabouts aren't graced by such a sign and thus make it incumbent for you to exercise the aforementioned priorité à droite rule; in other words, traffic on these roundabouts must yield to traffic entering. Regardless of signage, it should be immediately obvious if the traffic on or entering the roundabout is or is not waiting for you to enter. Once on the circle, you can go around indefinitely until you figure out which exit you want to take. You'll get the impression that you're skating around that old roller rink you used to go to as a kid. Indeed, you'll become a bit giddy. You'll quickly come to like these little rinks: they allow you to make unhurried decisions as your vehicle is moving, and they reduce the number of stops you must make. If two lanes enter a roundabout, you should stay in the inside lane, engaging your vehicle's inside blinker until you identify the exit you wish to take and until you pass the exit immediately before that one. Once you reach this point you should engage your vehicle's outside blinker, move into the outside lane, and exit the roundabout. England and France employ the most roundabouts.

Most countries empower their police to collect fines on the spot from violators. If the police require that you pay them, make sure you get a receipt; and if possible, make sure the nature of the offense and the amount of the fine as described on the receipt match the actual offense and the amount you paid. Police in France, Germany and Italy use roadblocks to conduct random checks of vehicles and drivers. Blood alcohol limits in Europe are given in milligrams (mg), so that's how I list them for each country. Note that a blood alcohol limit of, say, 80 mg is equal to a limit of 0.08 percent or 0.8 grams per liter. Radar-triggered cameras are increasingly used to enforce speed limits by photographing the license plate of an offending vehicle. The ticket is posted within a few days to the name and address on the registration. If it's a rental or tourist-lease, the company will get the ticket and charge you. If it's a foreign-registered vehicle, well, just wait and see. The photo used to accompany, but in several cases love affairs were thus exposed; so now you'll have to visit the police station to garner the evidence. Whereas the key first threshold for police officers who might write a ticket on the spot is reported to be a speed 10 percent over the limit, it's said that along highways the cameras are only triggered by vehicles going more than 20 km/h over. Furthermore, it's rumored only half the photos are unambiguous enough to result in a ticket. If you trigger one of these cameras you'll probably see the flash. Signs usually warn drivers if such an apparatus is permanently mounted along or above the road. But often they're mounted in unmarked police cars parked on the roadside or median, and in such case of course no signs attend.

On The Other Side

The main trouble that most North Americans face when driving in the British Isles is that they must drive on the left side of the road. Not only is the traffic flip-flopped, but the steering wheel is on the other side of the vehicle — and the gear shift is at your left hand instead of your right. (Although the shifting pattern is the same; and the accelerator is still at the right foot, with the brake pedal off to its left.) It's virtually impossible for a North American to practice driving this way before arriving in a country where left-side driving is the norm; the best we North Americans can do is use mental imagery to shed the right-side-of-the-road mindset. Yet the adaptability of the human brain is remarkable. In a matter of days a North American or continental European driving in the British Isles (or, for that matter, a Brit or Aussie or Kiwi driving on the continent) can supplant the mindset he or she assumed over a whole lifetime. It reminds me of an experiment in which scientists asked a man to wear a contraption that inverted his vision. He agreed. At first, the upside down world confused the man so that he stumbled around and could hardly feed himself. Within a week, however, he was functioning normally. When the scientists finally took the contraption off the man's head, the rightsideup world seemed upside down to him. Again he stumbled around and could hardly feed himself. This went on for years — no, just kidding; in a couple of days the man readjusted to the conventional world. If the human mind can adapt so quickly to the inversion of the whole world, surely you'll adapt to sitting on the right side of a vehicle, shifting with your left hand, and driving on the left side of the road.

Not only will you quickly adapt, but the benefits of driving will counteract the anxiety you'll experience in the transition period. In the meantime, the right attitude can minimize both this anxiety and the real danger that fuels it. Be cool. Take your time. Most Brits and Irish, experienced in motoring on the continent, empathize with and are thus tolerant of disoriented foreign drivers. When someone does honk at you, open your smile like a jackknife and wave at the irritated bloke like a bloody fool. Who cares? Remember, all will be OK as long as you don't hit anything. Soon you'll be zipping around like Jackie Stewart. The whole experience will make for good stories when you get home, and the you'll feel a genuine and justified pride in your accomplishment.

I must reiterate that it is legal to drive left-hand-drive vehicles (steering wheel on the left, gear shift on your right) in the British Isles and right-hand-drive vehicles on the continent, but it makes it virtually impossible to safely pass other vehicles unless you have an astute and trusted navigator in the passenger seat or unless the driver's seat is high enough to let you see over the majority of vehicles. The headlight beams should be adjusted before you make the switch. Naturally you can buy a headlight conversion kit in Europe. The kits contain specially shaped adhesive black plastic which sticks to the glass and alters the direction of the beam.

Parking

As I enthusiastically related in the Why Drive? chapter, you should be able to find free-of-charge parking all over Europe. Some neighborhoods, however, reserve free parking — or all parking — for residents. In such areas the residents' vehicles bear an official sticker. Check the other vehicles around yours to see if they all bear the same sort of sticker in the same place on one of the windows. No parking zones along streets (for instance, near bus stops) are often indicated by a zig-zag white line painted on the street.

Parking meters and "pay-and-display" schemes are common. A pay-and-display scheme requires you to pay at a central machine (some machines ask you to punch in your vehicle's license plate number too), press a button (usually the green one, the others are for local residents whose vehicle's bear special permits), receive a ticket that lists a time-of-day limit commensurate with the amount you paid, and display the ticket in readily visible spot on the dashboard (on the side closest to the curb if on the street). Most of these machines account for periods of the day when parking is free, so you can pay at night for the first hour or two after 8:00 or 9:00 a.m. the next day. In event of a defective machine you should use the parking disc I desribe next. You may then park for the maximum duration normally permitted at that location.

Figure Driving.1 A pay-and-display machine in Germany.		Figure Driving.2 Parking disc on dashboard.

Many cities in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland enforce Blue Zones or short-term parking areas which limit parking to an indicated duration, usually two hours. The marking of these zones varies from country to country. Before parking in a Blue Zone you must obtain special tickets or a disc from a tourist office, police station, or tobacconist. Sometimes you must buy the tickets or disc, but usually they're given free of charge. In fact most rental companies include a disc or "blue card" in their vehicles. When using a ticket, you write on it the date and time of your arrival (Europeans write the day number before the month number and use the military convention for noting times) and then display it on the side of your vehicle's dashboard closest to the curb. Discs, on the other hand, either bear a clock face and a set of unmechanized clock hands which you can set to show the time of your arrival (Figure Driving.2 above) or they actually function mechanically as clocks (see www.dotoni.ch). You may round-up to the next half-hour. If, for example, you arrive at 9:40, you can indicate 10:00. In lieu of these items a simple note left on your dashboard may suffice. It's worth noting that during my first extended motor tour of Europe I was unaware of such zones; I never bought tickets or obtained a disc, and I never suffered a penalty — and I parked in many cities and towns which supposedly enforce Blue Zones. Maybe I was lucky. If you're unsure about whether you should obtain a ticket or disc, check the dashboards of the other vehicles in the area to determine if other drivers feel it's necessary.

If you do get a parking ticket and you do feel compelled to pay it, most countries offer a rather ingenious way to do so. Take the ticket to a tobacconist, purchase a tax stamp (called a "timbre fiscal" in France) in the proper amount, affix the larger of the tax stamp's two sections to the ticket, and, using a regular stamp, mail the tax-stamped ticket to the address indicated on the ticket. Note that wheel clamps are coming into wider use.

Most parking garages and lots employ one rather clever pay-for-parking scheme. Upon entering, you receive a time-stamped ticket. Just before you leave, you take the ticket to a central processing machine and place it in a slot. The machine then prompts you to insert the appropriate amount of cash. (Many of these machines accept coins only; so it's a good idea to check this upon leaving your vehicle behind.) Insert the cash and the machine returns any change along with the ticket, which now bears the time and a certification of payment. Finally, you must present the ticket to the attendant or insert it in a machine to leave.

For the safety of their female customers, it's quite common in Europe for parking garages to reserve the most well lit and frequented area of the garage for women who are not accompanied by a male. This area usually corresponds to the first level of the garage. Look for signs reading, for example, "Nur Frau" (German for "Only Woman").

As I mentioned in the Why Drive? chapter, Barcelona harbors amazing car parks. When you drive in, an attendant directs you to continue into a chamber. Once you properly align the vehicle in the chamber, you exit both the vehicle and the chamber. Finally, the attendant closes the chamber, and the vehicle is hydraulically moved to some secret, subterranean vault. Be sure to remove your luggage when you remove yourself from the chamber: I once didn't and had to recall my car, drive it out, and pay before being able to re-park it.

Theft And Safety

Most theft in Europe is of the petty variety, rarely involving assault: the thief does not want a confrontation. Thus, by using your head you can prevent almost every potential crime.

For example, don't let people listen in or somehow note your phone card or credit card number. Watch your credit card after giving it to a clerk: you don't want the clerk to make extra imprints. Review all charge slips before you sign them. And be careful with your charge card receipts: they have the card number on them too. In fact, you should destroy old carbons, billing statements, and other records that bear your account number.

Don't flaunt your money or act too much like a tourist. You know how foreigners stand out as targets for crime. Don't compromise your trip, but don't unnecessarily make yourself a bigger target. Be discreet when doing your thing in banks, at ATM machines, or at exchange booths. Take note of the people around you. Try to blend in and look confident. If you have a shoulder bag, wear the strap across the shoulder opposite the side on which the bag hangs. Be careful in crowded places such as those around street performers and on metros and buses: pickpockets love crowds — especially crowds ripe with tourists. Beware at beaches. If two people approach you, one speaking to you and the other hovering around, go on red alert: the speaker may be trying to distract you while the other person nabs an item. And never fall asleep with a valuable next to you. Move in groups when it's convenient. In no way is the danger great enough that you should modify your itinerary; just be smart, that's all.

The further south you go the more you need to be aware of your possessions and personal space. Beware of young vagrant children and their adult cohorts who hover around and pickpocket travelers. Such thieves may walk into you with an open newspaper or large flat box held extended from their waste, wave a newspaper in your face, or throw a baby doll into your arms to distract you while their accomplices rifle through your pockets. Other thieves may approach you with flowers or some other triviality to sell; simply brush them off — and don't feel bad about it. I've even heard of tourists being glopped with mustard then "assisted" by ostensibly helpful bystanders who in fact did the glopping and who point to the sky and claim the stuff is bird doo while they wipe it off and swipe what they can. No matter, if you're aware of their presence and have taken simple security precautions, thieves will leave you alone.

Thefts from vehicles occur with alarming frequency in Spain and Southern Italy. Regardless of where you are, leave nothing of value in the vehicle. Leave the glove compartment open and emptied. If a rear seat pulls down to offer access to the trunk, pull it down — and leave the trunk empty. If you must leave something of value in the trunk, however, lock that seat so it can't be pulled down. If possible, lock the trunk from the driver's side lock so it can't be popped open without the key. If your vehicle has a hatchback, remove the shield that conceals the empty trunk. Consider leaving the front passenger door open to allow thieves easy access: otherwise, they'll break a lock or window. Essentially, make the scene look as if some other thief has been there already. If you drive into the larger cities, consider parking in front of embassies and banks where security may be better, or in an area where traffic police are working. Throughout Europe, parking ramps offer safer haven than the streets; but they may not be worth the cost.

The rate of theft of vehicles themselves is high in the city of Prague and in Poland. Consider parking in small towns outlying the larger cities. You can take the extremely cheap trains into the metro area. Thieves concentrate where the tourists are, and the tourists usually aren't in the small towns. Turning your wheels all the way to the curb may also help.

Some thieves are more aggressive than those I've mentioned so far. Keep your vehicle's doors locked when driving, and keep the vehicle in gear at a stop. If someone points to your tires as if indicating that the tires are flat, don't get out to look. If someone bumps you — especially if they bump you repeatedly — think twice before unlocking the doors and getting out of the vehicle. Rather, turn on your vehicle's hazard lights to signal that you're not fleeing, and drive slowly to a well-populated and well-lit place. Beware if you pick up a car rental or RV hire at Madrid's airport. The car rental companies there park their vehicles in unprotected and unsupervised areas, or at least they used to. As a result, thieves learned to puncture the tires, wait outside, follow exiting vehicles, and rob them when the unsuspecting driver pulls over with a flat. Always be wary of an offer of roadside help extended by anyone other than a uniformed police officer or civil guard. If a person stops to help, ask them to call the police. Conversely, don't you stop to help a stranded motorist: in the more marginal parts of Europe, roadside brigands are known to feign car trouble then steal your vehicle and/or rob you when you stop to help.

Lock away your baggage overnight, and lock the door to your room as well. When staying in a hostel, take a hint from nature and sleep with your valuables between your legs. Out of sight is out of mind; don't unnecessarily tempt thieves. Passports are a valuable commodity on the black market — keep yours secure. If you travel in a couchette on an overnight train, tie the door shut: thieves payoff conductors, put sleeping gas into compartments, and proceed to pilfer the unconscious occupants' possessions; if you're not careful, you'll wake up minus one suitcase or backpack but plus one big head ache. Italian trains have become infamous for such robberies. If something of yours does get stolen from your person, vehicle, or room and if you have some form of insurance to cover the theft of the item, make sure you get a police report at the next convenient opportunity, if you know what I mean.

And don't give up items for lost if they are stolen. Often thieves are only after cash and will dump wallets and other articles. Many are nice enough to throw the wallet — including credit cards — in a mailbox. The post will check your identification and deliver the wallet and contents either directly to your embassy or to the police who will forward it to your embassy. And police stations in Europe are often rife with stolen articles waiting to be claimed. If you've written your address on your articles, they may conveniently show up at your embassy like your wallet.

Overheating

In hot weather check the radiator's water level frequently. If the water level is low but not below the bottom of the header tank, you can immediately add water. If, however, the water is below this level, you should allow the engine to cool before adding water: otherwise you may damage the cylinder block. If the radiator is overheating, let it cool before very carefully and slowly opening the radiator cap. If you aren't careful, a rush of steam from the radiator may severely burn you. High engine temperatures resulting from some combination of a high ambient temperature, an ineffective cooling system, and extreme strain on the engine from, say, a steep ascent, can vaporize fuel in the lines, the pump, or the carburetor, causing the engine to stop. If such a stall occurs, let the engine cool off before trying to restart it.

Breakdowns And Accidents

If you've rented or leased a vehicle, your contract should entitle you to some form of roadside service. Regardless, chances are that the local motoring club will come to your aid. As I detailed in the Documents chapter, most of the European clubs belong to one of the two international touring organizations, either the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) or the Alliance Internationale de Tourisme (AIT) and thus are obligated to reciprocate their benefits to members of likewise-affiliated clubs. If you don't belong to an affiliated club, you can buy temporary membership in any number of European clubs. Even if you aren't reciprocally or directly a member of these clubs, they'll still come to your aid — for a charge. In the country-by-country descriptions, I include the address and phone number of all automobile clubs, and I note if they're affiliated with the FIA and/or AIT.

If you're battery is dead and it's in a manual transmission vehicle, you can get the vehicle started again by "popping the clutch." To do this, push in the clutch and hold it, put vehicle in second gear, have the vehicle pushed up to a speed that matches the speed associated with the second gear, then let the clutch out and turn the key. The energy of the turning axle is translated into the engine where the alternator transforms it into enough electric power to start the vehicle.

Get a receipt for any service you must pay for: your automobile club, rental or leasing company, or dealer may reimburse you if you do. Always secure a cost estimate before submitting your vehicle for maintenance.

In many areas, emergency phones are in place along major roads. Laws, unless I note otherwise in a country's description, require you to call police to the scene of any accident that involves you and that results in damage to a vehicle or person. However, sometimes — especially in the South — the parties involved can settle such damages on the spot. Such settlements are facilitated by the European Accident Statement. This form — found in the glove compartment or in the pocket on the driver's side door of most rental vehicles — provides a standard format on which to draw a diagram of the accident, note the information about the vehicles and drivers involved, and note other important facts about the accident. All drivers involved sign the form and receive a carbon copy; they then send a copy of their copy to their rental or leasing or insurance company. Of course you should carefully consider your insurance coverage before settling accidents without involving the police. Note that you should never sign a statement that you can't read; insist on a translation.

European Ferries

It's not unusual for European ferries to sport plush seats, televisions, cinemas, pools, saunas, nice restaurants, bars, live entertainment, casinos, children's playrooms, duty-free shops, and exchange bureaus. The food served aboard ferries is expensive, however; consider bringing your own sandwiches and drinks. Also expensive is the merchandise in the duty-free shops — except for the tobacco and alcohol, that is. In good weather you can stroll or sunbathe on the decks, throw bread to the playful gulls, and snap dramatic photos.

Cabins come in economy, standard, and luxury classes of varying capacity: single-berth, double-berth, triple-berth, and quad-berth. You can pay for a single berth in a multiple-berth room, but the ferry company retains the right to assign roommates. For some people the comfortable chairs or pullman's coaches may suffice as makeshift beds on overnight routes. Some budget travelers who embark on their first overnight sailing of the Mediterranean opt to sleep on the ferry's deck to save some cash. Bad idea. Summer nights on the open Mediterranean are surprisingly — and painfully — cold.

Many sources preach that you should book your ferry passage in advance if you plan to transport a vehicle across a principal ferry route during the high season. This is true, but the proper definition of "advance" may surprise you. Remember the fecundity of the unexpected that a motor vehicle allows to blossom? Most bookings entail high cancellation penalties, so booking ferry passage too far in advance stunts this important factor. Wait until you arrive overseas and settle into your trip before you make any "advance" booking for ferry passage — if you book at all. Besides, passage booked through domestic brokers is more expensive than passage booked directly with a ferry company. Many offer a simplified price structure, constant throughout the year, for tickets purchased outside Europe. Even during high season you may be able to pull up at the port unannounced, stop into the office, and succeed in securing a spot on the next ferry. However, don't expect this method to work as well as, say, flying standby: the high cancellation fees associated with ferry bookings oblige people to fulfill their reservations. But the ferries always have enough room for foot passengers; I recommend that foot passengers do not make a booking.

In at least two cases, however, you should definetly book ahead. First, if vehicle-passenger fares are cheaper than foot-passenger fares, you need to book ahead and declare then the passengers who'll be making the crossing with you. If you don't do this, the ferry company will require your passengers to pay foot-passenger fares — which are more expensive. This policy discourages drivers from offering passage to hitchhikers or other foot passengers in exchange for cash. Second, if you plan to secure a cabin on an overnight ferry, definitely reserve the cabin and your passage in advance. When reserving space for your vehicle, you must describe the type of vehicle, its license number, its length, and its height — including any roof luggage or equipment.

Fares or "tariffs" charged by a particular ferry company for a particular sailing might depend on the time of day, the day of the week, the time of the year, the age and organizational affiliation of the passenger, and the size and type of vehicle being transported.

Overnight sailings long enough to allow for a good night's sleep tend to be more expensive than long daytime sailings; whereas short daytime sailings tend to be more expensive than short nighttime sailings. Holiday and weekend (usually defined as Friday afternoon to Sunday) sailings tend to be more expensive than normal weekday sailings. And peak summer sailings are, of course, more expensive than shoulder and low season sailings (except for those sailings around, say, Christmas).

Fares also depend on whether a passenger is in a vehicle or on foot, and on whether he's a child, youth, student, senior citizen, handicapped person, HI member, holder of a rail pass, auto club member, soldier, or diplomat.

Finally, the fares for vehicle transport depend on the size (length, height, width) and/or type of vehicle or combination of vehicles.

Most ferry companies calculate return (two-way) fares using the single fares applicable at the time of the passenger's departure instead of those applicable at the time of their return, simply doubling these fares or taking roughly 10 to 20 percent off the sum. Some companies, however, compute return fares as the average of the outward and inward single fares or offer them at single — or even lower — rates providing you return on a specific scheduled but unpopular sailing or on the same day.

Several groups of ferry companies have joined up to offer "Landbridge" tickets that cover passage from, say, Ireland to Britain to France to Ireland; or from, say, Britain to the Netherlands and from Denmark to Sweden, both legs being return. It's usually cheaper to buy such a ticket than to buy separate tickets to achieve the same end.

After widdling down the selection of ferry services, contact the remaining few. Begin each inquiry by explaining to the ferry representative your planned date or dates of ferry travel. Ask about the sailing schedule for that day or days. Ask if the different departures during the day charge different fares. Ferries tend to service relatively short routes many times a day. On the other hand, ferries may service relatively long routes only once or twice a week. The frequency of ferry service also varies with the season: more ferries ply the waters in summer than in winter, and some may halt service altogether in the off season. If you definitely need a two-way ticket, be sure to ask for return fares. If not, ask how the company calculates return fares. If you're arranging passage for a large group, ask about special group rates. Describe the height and length of your vehicle and, if it's a large van or minibus, the number of seats it has. Ask if any special offers applying to your type of vehicle will be in effect around your planned dates of travel. If you're under 26 years of age, ask if the company offers youth discounts. If you'll be traveling with children, note the age range for which children's fares are valid. If you're a student, determine if the company offers student fares; if they do, ask what documents (ISIC, for example) they require as evidence of your student status. If you consider yourself a senior citizen, determine if the company offers reduced fares for seniors and if the company considers you a senior. (You may need to be a member of a certain senior citizen organization.) Handicapped persons, ask if you're entitled to a discount. Hostellers, ask if discounts apply to card-carrying HI members. Railpass holders, ask if you qualify for a discount or free passage. Members of auto clubs, determine if reductions apply to you and your family. Soldiers and diplomats, ask if reductions apply to you and your family. In all cases, ask if the discounts apply to both persons and vehicles. Reductions are not cumulative, so opt for the one that gives you the greatest discount. Be sure to determine what cancellation charges apply. If pertinent, ask whether the company allows stop-overs. If stop-overs are possible, note how far in advance you must declare your intention to stop-over and what embarkation/disembarkation fees apply. Finally, ask how early you must report for check-in; plan to arrive at the port at least one hour before a scheduled departure. Signs depicting car-bearing boats radiate for miles around a ferry port, so it's easy to find the dock. And note that it's usually illegal to carry containers of spare fuel on ferries. Quite a few ferries do, however, allow you to carry tanks of propane.

Channel Tunnel

The Romans mused over the idea. Napoleon in 1802 approved a Channel Tunnel project designed for stagecoaches and to be ventilated by chimneys rising above the water's surface. The British made an abortive stab at it in 1880. Ground wasn't seriously broken again in this respect until 1987. Some US$15 billion and seven years later, the finished product of over 15,000 workers ran 50 kilometers (31 miles) from Cheriton (near Folkestone), England, to Coquelles (near Calais), France, 37 of those kilometers through chalk marl, the roof just 25–45 meters below the seabed. The "Chunnel" is the second longest rail tunnel in the world, the longest being the tunnel under Japan's Strait of Tsugaru.

Not just one tunnel, the Chunnel consists of two large parallel train tunnels serviceable through a third parallel tunnel between them. That's right, train tunnels: you can't drive your vehicle straight through. Instead, after paying at a toll booth and passing through frontier controls, you'll be directed to drive onto a long train — "Le Shuttle" — along with other cars, as well as buses and trucks. There are four shuttles, one departing every fifteen minutes during peak times, every hour during the night; each can carry up to 180 cars and is confined to the Chunnel and its approaches. Thus the Channel Tunnel allows up to 720 vehicles per hour to come off England's M22 motorway, drive onto a shuttle, ride piggyback under the ocean, roll off the train, and roll onto France's A16 or A26 autoroute, or vice versa. Of course connections to lesser roads are accessible as well. Unless passengers want to stretch or use the toilets, there's no reason for them to get out of their vehicles: the chambers are brightly lit, sound-proofed and air-conditioned but extremely spartan, and while enroute Customs officials walk from vehicle to vehicle, checking passports. Motorcyclists, however, travel in a special compartment, separated from their cycles. The whole process, including the embarking and disembarking, takes an average of only one hour — compared to three if you employ a conventional ferry to achieve the same end.

Fares are charged per vehicle, no matter the number of passengers, with four sets according to the time of year. Advance booking by phone or internet for a specific scheduled service is by far the best and cheapest way to obtain passage. You can turn up and pay at the time of travel, but that will be expensive and you may not find space on the next shuttle at busy times. If you have a reservation, you can turn up two hours before departure (or two hours late!) and you will usually be given a choice of the next departure or to wait for your booked one. Hence there's little need to worry about getting to the terminal at exactly the right time.

For people without a vehicle to transport, 394-meter-long "Eurostar" trains run through the Chunnel at 300 km/h (186 mph) non stop between London and Calais, Lille, Paris and Brussels. The London-to-Paris trip, for instance, takes just three hours instead of the grueling six associated with ferry passage, and the standard class approximating a typical airliner's business class, complete with reading lamps and footrests. There are nearly 30 trains in each direction each day. Tickets can be bought in advance or on the day of travel.

It's said that travel through the Chunnel — protected by anti-terrorist security measures similar to those at international airports — is at least 20 times safer than conventional rail travel, which in turn is much safer than ferry or car travel.

If you're curious about the construction of the Chunnel, you should check out the Eurotunnel Exhibition Center at Cheriton, near Folkestone. Besides a large operating model of the link, there's an observation tower giving a bird's-eye view of the Folkestone terminal. A simulator makes it possible to "drive" a tunnel construction train. You can view an audio-visual show. And you can inspect a full-size mock-up of a shuttle.