lazlo52

Member
Seems I'll be the first to post here. I live in Lower Normandy outside the town of Domfront. Currently in the UK until about the second week in August if you want anything bringing back.
 
I do about 3 trips a year but I live in Normandy and use the ferry Portsmouth to Caen so cannot give you the best route. I would suspect you would go via Calais (strikes permitting) travelling down the eastern side of France.
 
:)I get to the UK three or four times a year, used to travel from home in South West France via Zebrugge to Hull. It used to be a reasonable fare, return with dinner, breakfast and an outside cabin, around the £400 mark. It's now up to £650 and not worth it. So it's the shorter drive in France to either Calais, or Dunkirk and the longer drive in the UK via the dreaded M25 to head North.
 
Date 10th Sept 2015

URGENT

Have a 110 Defender with transmission failure located south of Limoges.

If anyone is driving to UK with an empty vehicle trailer I'd be interested in having a chat about delivery to East Sussex LR garage.

Best!

24/7
+33 (0) 555 75 56 03
 
Date 10th Sept 2015

URGENT

Have a 110 Defender with transmission failure located south of Limoges.

If anyone is driving to UK with an empty vehicle trailer I'd be interested in having a chat about delivery to East Sussex LR garage.

Best!

24/7
+33 (0) 555 75 56 03

That's a big ask but you might be lucky.

Try messaging @Datatek , @Truffe , @Volusia, I doubt they'll be able to help directly and I've no idea where you (or they) are in France but they might have contacts.

How urgent is URGENT?
 
Do you make the trip often? I want to drive to Morzine in march. Be interesting to know the best ways to travel from the UK.
Dover, Calais. Auto rout down to Paris. Once you go through the tunnel under the runway at Charles De Gaullel airport which crosses over the motorway take the first major road right. Then keep to your left all the time until you get to Port de Italy.
Take the next exit after Port de Italy which is about a hundred yards or so. I think its signed for Lyon. Head for N7, Dordive, Nevers ,Macon, Bourg en Bresse, then head for Geneva. Or you could take the auto rout from Paris to Lyon then pick up the signs for Geneva. Really depends on what vehicle your doing it in. Too much motorway in a Defender can be boring so I would take the N7 and avoid some toll roads. From Calais you could take the national roads to Paris down through Abberville but its an awful road through loads of villages and towns where all the old farts drive along at 40 KPH if your lucky and very little overtaking points. I wouldn't do that road if I could avoid it or otherwise do it during the night when all the old farts are ****ed and in bed.
 
Dover, Calais. Auto rout down to Paris. Once you go through the tunnel under the runway at Charles De Gaullel airport which crosses over the motorway take the first major road right. Then keep to your left all the time until you get to Port de Italy.
Take the next exit after Port de Italy which is about a hundred yards or so. I think its signed for Lyon. Head for N7, Dordive, Nevers ,Macon, Bourg en Bresse, then head for Geneva. Or you could take the auto rout from Paris to Lyon then pick up the signs for Geneva. Really depends on what vehicle your doing it in. Too much motorway in a Defender can be boring so I would take the N7 and avoid some toll roads. From Calais you could take the national roads to Paris down through Abberville but its an awful road through loads of villages and towns where all the old farts drive along at 40 KPH if your lucky and very little overtaking points. I wouldn't do that road if I could avoid it or otherwise do it during the night when all the old farts are ****ed and in bed.
Wow! You know it well. . This is good info! Thanks for this.
 
Date 10th Sept 2015

URGENT

Have a 110 Defender with transmission failure located south of Limoges.

If anyone is driving to UK with an empty vehicle trailer I'd be interested in having a chat about delivery to East Sussex LR garage.

Best!

24/7
+33 (0) 555 75 56 03
Sorry, saw this a bit late, if you still need help you have a local Landy Garage (english chap) 'garage Cole' at 1, Rue Saint Antoine Charroux, 86250 France Numéro de téléphone: 05 49 87 72 40. http://www.garagecole.com.

Hope this helps
 
Marcus - thanks for the heads up about the garage in Charroux - might be useful should I take Mulberry when we visit the hovel next August. Its a small world - we have friends who live in Charroux. I wonder if they know of garage Cole?? Might be handy for them being expats an all!
 
Just to add to that, Andy helped me out last year by replacing the gearbox in my disco. Very knowledgeable landy mechanic and very helpful at the right price. Accepted delivery from UK of 2nd hand box and then fitted it for me. Not many businesses here would be prepared to use 2nd hand parts. saved me a fortune, good lad.
 
Bump. Me and a couple of mates will be in Normandy at the beginning of June; I note on the sanef uk website that there's some kind of air quality sticker needed ("Crit’ Air")? Since I don't speak much French (apart from "Une bière s'il vous plait"!), so any advice on this would be helpful; there'll be two Discos going over, a D1 TDi300, and my D2 Td5. Cheers for any advice in advance!
 
Sorry for the delay in responding.

My understanding is that the implemetation of the requirement of Crit Air stickers currently is only in certain metropolitan areas – Paris, Lille, Grenoble and a couple of others at the moment.

Other towns have the ability to impose them when they wish. For example my local city of Rennes will be demanding them from October but only in times of peak pollution ( which happen every summer so I'm going to have to get one soon)

Basically , dependent upon the level of pollution, they'll be banning different classifications of vehicles on certain days.

Any vehicle built before 97 can't get a sticker.

I've had a quick check on Normandy and can't find anything on any metropolitan areas requiring them there but with the French anything can change and probably will. If you are planning on heading into any larger towns in Normandy then it's probably worth googling “crit air” combined with the name of the town for the latest status. e.g. Rouen in Normandy is planning on introducing them from 2020

If you're going to need one you can get one here https://www.certificat-air.gouv.fr/en ( in english)

Happy to be corrected if anyone knows more.

Mick
 
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and I've no idea if the cross border directive applies to this allowing them to chase UK registered vehicles for fines. Maybe someone else can clarify.
 
No idea either, but it's less than a fiver, so I got one as a belt and braces (I'm there now!). Peace of mind, don't appear to have needed it thus far, but it's for the life of the wagon, so future proofs me for subsequent visits ;)
 
Good idea. One thing to note is that the French regard the accent of brits speaking french just as we brits regard the french accent. Tres sexy. So even if you only know a few words of french it's a good idea to use them. It goes down really well and the smiles you get are not just taking the mickey. Hope you have a good time.

Mick
 

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