robthedog:
Carryfast:
Dennis Javelin:
Ray Smyth:
I was watching the news on BBC TV earlier today, and it showed the enormous queues of cars, coaches, & lorries because it is
the start of the busiest holiday season. A reporter spoke to a family bound for Dover, they were a young couple and 4 children.
The family were from somewhere in the South East of England, and their destination was a campsite in Brittany. Their journey
would be approx 70 miles to Dover, and 450 miles from Calais to Brittany…a total of 520 miles, plus another 520 to drive home.
If they had drove to Plymouth, approx 250 miles, and sailed to Roscoff with Brittany Ferries, their total mileage would be about
500 miles and saved a fortune on fuel.Ray Smyth.
This is where we have the advantage of being transport professionals - we can think outside of the box. Just wonder if there’s much difference in the price though with the longer crossings but certainly the savings on fuel would be big. My experience of folks from the south east tends to be that they think the world ends outside of the M25 though. Going to Plymouth would be space travel for them
The roads from the South East to Devon are a joke.Basically it’s A30 or A303.Or A31 followed by an even more convoluted route of basket case roads.That 250 miles can take well over 6 hours.
The last run I did via Dover I used the A21 and then the cart tracks across to Dymchurch and Folkestone.The M25 and M20 are now a no go basket case.In large part because of Northerners and Westerners being fixated on using the Dover Calais route.
Added to which is the fact that the government and EU have imposed penalties on the longer crossings meaning the end of the direct North Sea crossings to Scandinavia and Germany.
The choice for me now is either Portsmouth or Harwich.Dover just isn’t worth all the aggro.Bearing in mind Portsmouth is actually closer and easily makes up for any extra distance needed on much better French roads.
As for the Tunnel obviously no one likes the idea of being stuck under the sea in a 25 mile long hole in the ground with only an exit at each end.
My next trip will probably be to Swiss and Austria via Harwich having finally got my new passport after an almost 3 month wait.Up to harwich to the hoek to go down to Swiss you really are raving mad old son but we all know that anyway
For Swiss I usually prefer going via Germany anyway.
So you prefer battling with all the aggro on the M25 and M20 or the now often the clogged alternatives and French border ‘controls’.
Then getting nicked by Gendarmes for not driving at silly Brit speeds on roads designed for 120 mph like the A26 and A4 to Strasbourg and paying a rip off toll for the privilege.
So I’m going to Germany anyway might as well use the 120 via the 414 Hertford and Harwich to get further East and avoid all the Kent and French aggro.
You do know Swiss and Austria are well East of Dover.