the honey moon idea

[garrykiller]

i am looking at honey moon possiblities, the misses wants to see Barcelona or Florence. so i said what about both...

heres my plan

hire a car (my idea was maybe Fiat 500)
start point is Southampton

Day	Places	drive time
1	Southampton to Portsmouth ferry to Le Harve (overnight)	0
2	Le Havre to Le Mans to La Rochelle	5hour 5 mins
3	La Rochelle to Toulouse	4 hours
4	Toulouse to Barcelona	3 hours 41 mins
5	stay in barcelona	0
6	Barcelona to Marselle	4 hours 40 mins
7	Marcelle to Monte Carlo to Genova	4 hours

||8||Genova to Florence||2 hours 40 mins||

9	Florence to Torino to Lyon	7 hours 40 mins
10	Lyon to Châlons-en-Champagne to Lille	6 hours
11	Lille to Southampton via Calais	4 hours 50 mins

(travel time taken from aa route planner)

Just gotta get the misses on board that 3000 miles in a car is more fun than flying and staying in one place.

has anyone done similar trips? Sucessful? Unsucessful?

[ewenm]

All depends how the OH feels about spending most of her (oh ok, your) honeymoon in a car...

My OH and I did 4000 miles across the USA in the Caterham in 2005 and loved it but it was certainly no luxury trip.

[Hub]

I would fly in to Barcelona as a start point and then hire something cool and start the road trip from there, giving you more time in exotic locations (assuming you can secure some sort of one way rental for a not extortionate sum!)

[Tallbut Buxomly]

You could try these guys as they have always been very reasonable on mileage.

http://www.kendallcars.com/car-rental.php

[Beardy10]

Most hire companies do not allow you to take a hire car abroad without additional costs!

But before you even get to that I think your barking mad unless your future wife REALLY wants to do it. You are on a hiding to nothing. France is a stunning country but generally it's not best viewed from Autoroutes. If you really think driving works you are definitely trying to do too much....I would do either city but not both ? Look like you have allowed yourself a day in Barcelona and half a day in Florence ? Is it really worth driving all the way to Florence for half a day there? Plus that autoroute along the South of France gets v.v. busy and can have some shocking traffic.

[garrykiller]

Hub said:

I would fly in to Barcelona as a start point and then hire something cool and start the road trip from there, giving you more time in exotic locations (assuming you can secure some sort of one way rental for a not extortionate sum!)

this was the other idea i had.


i think its going to be too expesive compared to flying and staying. as i am going to be looking at least £400 on fuel alone! back to the drawing board!

[HereBeMonsters]

Fly to Barca, rent a one way (more expensive, but hey) and drive across to Florence.

If you do it in your car, just overnight it down to Barcelona, sharing the driving (I'm sure Soph would be up for that!) and you're there. Don't piss about in France, it's full of the French.

[Murph7355]

My other half would never have considered road trips before I introduced her to them Likes them now (we've done 3). But...

It wasn't in a Fiat 500.

I've never been in a 500, but is it (or anything in the same rental category) genuinely a car that you can do 7-8hr stints in, 2 up with a lot of luggage? (Genuine query). And how capable of being a GT is it, as to make the times you'll likely need to be pressing on. My other half's Beetle's a nice car in many respects. But going 3hrs up the M1 in it isn't a strength, let alone a few hours on stty Italian Autostradas.

Barcelona and Florence are two cracking cities. Have you considered flying into one, experiencing it, and then flying into the other?

If you really want to do some driving, spend 4 days or so in Barcelona, fly to Florence, hire your 500 and mix your time between Florence, Pisa, Siena and Ravenna.

[Murph7355]

PS Marseille's a ste hole. And I think your Barcelona to Marseille timing is optimistic unless you take the duller roads (if you do that, you'd be better off flying ).