I’ve never driven in a foreign country. When we drove around Ireland, I made Porter do all the driving. Now, I’m going to France for the Plenary, and I’m renting a car. The only thing that’s making me less jittery about doing so is having a friend who lives there and is feeding me driving tips for driving on the Riviera like:
- Traffic coming from the right has right-of-way unless they have a solid white line or dashed white line.
- Always lock your doors while driving
- No turning on red
- France now has speed cameras, and they’re not friendly.\
Oh, and I have Doctor Who on my iPod. MoviesForMyiPod rules.
Doctor Who on your … okay, for the first time ever, I’m jealous of someone’s iPod.
Why not just use cabs or public transportation? Granted, I’ve only been to Europe twice, but I didn’t feel like I needed a car either time thanks to their excellent infrastructure of trains, etc. I even got an international drivers license before our first trip just in case.
Seems to me that its just us Americans that are so used to our driving culture that feel the need to rent cars in Europe.
This is the first time renting a car in Europe. The previous two times, I took taxis, the train, got a ride, or walked. Cabs on the Riviera are insanely expensive. If you take the ride to and from the airport, and throw in two more cab rides (like, say, to dinner and back), I’d already be over what I’ll be spending on the car.
Cabs can also be hard to come by. I got stranded last trip and had to wait an hour for a cab to show up (after calling a couple cab companies and trying to declare my need for a cab in really bad French).
With my ankle still suspect, I don’t think public transportation is going to work, since the train station is a kilometer from the hotel.
Yeah, so I’m renting a car.