Off on holiday tomorrow

Going to some place in Holland just outside Amsterdam and driving through France and Belgium on the way.

I'm going in my Mk4, but it's currently in a bit of a state body-wise. I was just wondering whether I'm going to get any hastle off the respective fuzz patrols along the way. My car is all dark metallic red except for the bonnet which is matt black and the front bumper which is flash red. i've heard they are really strict abroad and so i was just wondering whether this is going to be an issue i might get pulled over for?

i think i've got all other bases covered.. just bought 2 new tyres and an RAC 'european driving pack' with triangle, vest and spare bulb kit etc, it's just this little worry really.

remeber to drive on the other side of the road

Your worried about getting pulled over because you've got different coloured body panels?

lol!!

http://www.theaa.com/motoring_advice/overs...ral_advice.html

Have a looksie there mate

Your fucked if you drive a Harlequin lmao

haha!!

remeber to drive on the other side of the road

This is actually a good point. On country lanes where there are no street lamps or lane markings it is easy to forget, especialy if it's just a short break.

Might not be the case in Belgium or Holland though as they are a bit more advanced than Portugal which is where we had these problems!

I know when I'm driving to the ring I'm going to end up on the wrong side of the road more than once.

Roundabouts are going to be mind boggling

Buy this aswell, it has everything you need (legally in some countries) fro driving over seas.

http://shop.theaa.com/store/car-accessorie...and-touring-kit

They have changed some things in the description since I bought it, but its dropped in price too. Although when I received mine it had more in it that the description said

Edit: wrong link

Edited 16 August, 200917 yr by B-shaw

Roundabouts would be a nice person. I'd end up kerbing my wheels!

In Portugal we knocked off 5 car mirrors on the first day in our shitty rented Fiat Cunto!

( I wasn't driving btw )

^^

"Roundabouts would be a nice person"

LOL

How did you get away with saying Cunto but not nice person ?

it has a O on the end, thats why. lo!

Have you got any European breakdown cover?

Worth the money if you haven't although I broke down in France last year and they wouldn't repatriate my car coz it wasn't worth enough money so they put me up in a hotel for 2 days instead until it was fixed.

Also, you're only covered third party when you take your car abroad, but if it's in such a state it probably doesn't matter. :-)

Yeah, id strongly recomend european breakdown cover. Because in england you could get friends to help if you are in the shit, abroad i think they would tell you where to shove it

haha yeah i'm definately going to forget at least once that we drive on the other side of the road lol

and good, i guess i was just worrying excessively about different coloured panels, but i thought i had better check as i just don't want to get pulled and get done dfor something completely different (although to my knowledge the car is perfectly road worthy). i've just heard all these tales about how strict they are.. it's the first time i've driven abroad.

and yeah have got some EU breakdown cover also, definately a must

anyways i'm hitting the road within the hour, cheers fellas! :-D

i got back from a massive trip round europe a feww weeks back its not to bad just check your blind spots !!! and also the french use the horn to tell you they are there etc !!! have fun !!!

matt

It's the drive back that would be the worse for me I was gunna drive to dam in June but ended up getting a plan cus I was planing on getting fucked up and driving on the other side of the road would have been difficult . And I would have been smokeing the whole way back and recovering and driving is not Fun when you can't be arsed lol.

I've just come back from Germany from my 10 day holiday. Drove down to newcastle, over on the ferry to Amsterdam, then drove through Holland and into Germany to Bonn where my sister stays.

Getting use to driving on the right took me about a day. You get use to it quickly.

A few handy tips for you:-

If you are coming upto a junction with no road marking as to who has right of way its always the junction to your right that you have to stop for. if there is nobody there then you dont need to stop.

On some junctions you can turn right even if the light is on red, just mind the pedestrians as they have right over way over you.

DONT FLASH YOUR LIGHTS AT ANYONE! Its illegal!

Just a few things that i was told while I was over there by my sister. but that was Germany, so other contries may vary!

I seem to remember something about having your breakdown gear (triangle, hi-vis etc) in the car and not in the boot. Apparently you can be done for walking around the side of your car to get them out of the boot if you breakdown.

Roundabouts are going to be mind boggling

I reguarly drive in France and its not as mind boggling as you think mate,

When you arrive to the roundabout it generally pushes you into the right direction and is really hard to get it wrong.

Just follow everyone else :p

I seem to remember something about having your breakdown gear (triangle, hi-vis etc) in the car and not in the boot. Apparently you can be done for walking around the side of your car to get them out of the boot if you breakdown.

The high vis has to be within reach of the driver but I don't think it applies to the triangle. I'm not sure if you're meant to have a high vis for each passenger, can't hurt can it?

Roundabouts are going to be mind boggling

I reguarly drive in France and its not as mind boggling as you think mate,

When you arrive to the roundabout it generally pushes you into the right direction and is really hard to get it wrong.

Just follow everyone else :p

yeah I've never had any problems driving on the wrong side, i tend to have a bit of a moment at some point after returning to the UK where I'm not sure which side I'm meant to be on but it's nothing serious... Worst thing I tried was driving a LHD LWB van over there, clipped curbs galore as I go for the door handle rather than the gear stick.....

What someone said about flashing lights above, at least in france if someone's flashing their lights at you it generally means police up ahead. Feel free to flash other motorists once you've spotted the police but don't let em see you...

just got back tonight - it wasn't all as bad as i thought!

like someone said in the thread above, yeh you get used to it really quickly. and in NL the roads are so open that you can see everything up ahead and have loads of time to plan where to go etc

the worst part of the drive was when i was driving back through france about 20 miles away from Calais i got pulled by the french customs! they were looking for 'grass' but didn't seem too impressed with my chalkboard bonnet either lol.

for those of you who have been to holland before, did any of you notice the crazy amount of Polo 'SE' models out there (Mk4) ? The first one I saw i thought was a valver and stared at it in a fleeting moment of jealousy and was then surprised when I saw another, and then another. when i had seen about five of them it clicked that they must be the SE models as they all had common clear front indicators and smoked repeaters and rear lights (aswell as the 16v bumpers). does anyone know whether they sold much more SEs in europe than the UK? particularly holland though, as neither france or belgium had as many SEs (in fact I only saw one in belguim and no french ones).

just something i picked up on, probably due to the fact that i was driving my Mk4 at the time. would be interesting to know a bit more about it if anyone else noticed the same thing!