Roadtrip - to Transylvania and Back
Discussion
Just got back yesterday from a reasonably big road trip from London to my OH's home city in Romania. Covered a fair few miles (about 3,000 in total) and the car of choice was a 14 year old Audi A4. New winter tyres were purchased, EU driving kit ordered from ebay, and the car was serviced to try and catch anything that might go bang in the middle of nowhere.
Was quite a interesting trip as got to sample the roads of France, Belgium, Netherlands, Austria, Germany, Hungary and Romania (and back again)
Surprisingly (to me, anyway) the busiest roads were in Germany. I had visions of screaming down the famous autobahns at 140 mph with supercars overtaking me at 200 mph. I think I only ever got up to 130 briefly, but was more often only at around 100-110. Not many people went past quicker than that and didn't see a single 'supercar' the whole way. Guess they're all parked up for the winter.
The two best motorways happened to be in Hungary and Romania - both very new and almost completely empty! The best driving roads were also in Romania. Some of the roads over the hills were amazing; fresh new tarmac, wide and with lovely bends and dips. I think some of the EU cash is being put to good use!
Best drivers seemed to be in Austria and France. Very good lane discipline! Someone flipped their car on the motorway within our first 2 hours of our trip, causing massive traffic jams and us to miss out train thus giving the brits the worst drivers award. Notable second to the Romanians for their insane overtaking manoeuvres.
Sadly the quattro/winter tyres combo didn't get much of a workout. No snow anywhere I went (my one day snowboarding in Austria was greeted with only 3 open runs). Only ice was a little bit in a carpark outside the ski resort (so did a few cheeky donuts to test the tyres).
For a really old car the Audi was amazing. Enough grunt to move along nicely on the motorways, enough space to fit a lot of crap (including a snowboard) and enough grip to handle mud roads.
Oh, lastly - anyone else doing a similar trip needs to double check all the roadtaxes etc beforehand. In german cities you need a emissions sticker on your car which we didn't have. Got away with it (i think..) but were a bit worried about getting stopped... Also, most toilets in Europe (i.e. petrol stations) require 70 cents to spend a penny, so make sure you have enough change (nearly got caught short a few times).
Was quite a interesting trip as got to sample the roads of France, Belgium, Netherlands, Austria, Germany, Hungary and Romania (and back again)
Surprisingly (to me, anyway) the busiest roads were in Germany. I had visions of screaming down the famous autobahns at 140 mph with supercars overtaking me at 200 mph. I think I only ever got up to 130 briefly, but was more often only at around 100-110. Not many people went past quicker than that and didn't see a single 'supercar' the whole way. Guess they're all parked up for the winter.
The two best motorways happened to be in Hungary and Romania - both very new and almost completely empty! The best driving roads were also in Romania. Some of the roads over the hills were amazing; fresh new tarmac, wide and with lovely bends and dips. I think some of the EU cash is being put to good use!
Best drivers seemed to be in Austria and France. Very good lane discipline! Someone flipped their car on the motorway within our first 2 hours of our trip, causing massive traffic jams and us to miss out train thus giving the brits the worst drivers award. Notable second to the Romanians for their insane overtaking manoeuvres.
Sadly the quattro/winter tyres combo didn't get much of a workout. No snow anywhere I went (my one day snowboarding in Austria was greeted with only 3 open runs). Only ice was a little bit in a carpark outside the ski resort (so did a few cheeky donuts to test the tyres).
For a really old car the Audi was amazing. Enough grunt to move along nicely on the motorways, enough space to fit a lot of crap (including a snowboard) and enough grip to handle mud roads.
Oh, lastly - anyone else doing a similar trip needs to double check all the roadtaxes etc beforehand. In german cities you need a emissions sticker on your car which we didn't have. Got away with it (i think..) but were a bit worried about getting stopped... Also, most toilets in Europe (i.e. petrol stations) require 70 cents to spend a penny, so make sure you have enough change (nearly got caught short a few times).
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