DRIVING EUROPE FOR 4 WEEKS

Tracey, Somebody here will tell you not to use all capital letters because it is considered shouting when communicating electronically. Don't listen to them. You can use capitals if you want.

Oops! Sorry, pretty computer illiterate I'm afraid!!!!

You certainly can't be more computer illiterate than me! Anyway, are you renting a car? If so, where and are you aware if you rent in one country and drop off in another you must be rich to do so. If you drive in Italy, need an international drivers license. We can get them here in US at AAA, not sure about Australia. let us know where you are starting trip and modes of transport and people will help.

I can promise you that you want to avoid the center city of Paris, Rome, Florence and many others. In a way, cars in big cities are curses; and are to be parked. This is my old itinerary thru the same area: Amsterdam 3 days Rhine River trip thru Cologne to Bacharach 1 day Bacharach to Munich 1 day Stay around Munich 3 days Drive over to Salzburg 2 days Drive down to Innsbruck 1 or 2 days Drive down to Venice 1 day Hang around Venice 2 days Drive thru Bologna and past Florence to a Tuscan or Chianti agriturismo. Drive 3 days through the region visiting San Gimignano, Volterra and Siena. Take day trips back into Florence for 2 or 3 days. Drive down to Orvieto and spend 2 nights. (Great hill top fortress) Take time to drive out to Civita. Drive into Rome area, looking for a B&B outside the city on a train line. Spend 4 nights there (or more if time permits.) Suburbs has as much to see as the center city of Rome. Forget Croatia, as it's the other side of the Adriatic and hard to get to.
I'll stop there. This is getting long. Switzerland, Paris and London are like a different trip. It might be hard to take in all 3 with only 4 weeks.

my suggestion would be to use ViaMichelin or a similar mapping source to plot out the times and general routes for your trip. It looks like you are trying to get ab bit much into four weeks I am a big believer in the Renault or Peugeot lease programs and, if you fly in and out of Paris you could spend a couple of days getting rid of jet lag and then take the RER out to CDG and pick up your car and head to Amsterdam and continue your trip as a big loop, dropping the car off at CDG and flying to London. Always avoid driving in the cities and take a GPS that you are familiar with as ell as some good maps. While in the Rhine Valley a night at the Schloss auf Schoenburg at Oberwessel is great if your budget allows. I would also suggest a night or two in Lauterbrunnen Switzerland, there are many things to see there and it is just beautiful country. I have heard both men and women describe it as "Just a little piece of heaven." As Gail said, don't forget your International Driving Permit. You must have one to drive in Italy or Austria and while you will hopefully never be asked or need to show it, if you do need it, it is worth more than its weight in gold. The fine starts at 250 Euros on the spot and if yo have an accident the financial downside is almost unlimited since insurance companies have been known to invalidate you insurance because you are technically an unlicensed driver. Have a great trip.

My suggestion would be to use ViaMichelin or a similar mapping source to plot out the times and general routes for your trip. It looks like you are trying to get ab bit much into four weeks I am a big believer in the Renault or Peugeot lease programs and, if you fly in and out of Paris you could spend a couple of days getting rid of jet lag and then take the RER out to CDG and pick up your car and head to Amsterdam and continue your trip as a big loop, dropping the car off at CDG and flying to London. Always avoid driving in the cities and take a GPS that you are familiar with as well as some good maps. While in the Rhine Valley a night at the Schloss auf Schoenburg at Oberwessel is great if your budget allows. I would also suggest a night or two in Lauterbrunnen Switzerland, there are many things to see there and it is just beautiful country. I have heard both men and women describe it as "Just a little piece of heaven." As Gail said, don't forget your International Driving Permit. You must have one to drive in Italy or Austria and while you will hopefully never be asked or need to show it, if you do need it, it is worth more than its weight in gold. The fine starts at 250 Euros on the spot and if you have an accident the financial downside is almost unlimited since insurance companies have been known to invalidate your insurance because you are technically an unlicensed driver. Have a great trip.

Read the thread "Problems with Budget" under General Europe by 'Don', last post 01/06/2013...

Hi Tracey, It's a really exciting trip you are planning here, lots to look forward to. I cannot help you so much with hire cars or licences as you live outside the EU but with logisitics i'm your man. From the UK we've driven to all the countries you are interested in. Your itinerary is perfectly doable in four weeks. 250 miles per day (including days when you don't drive) is a healthy average. i recommend that you don't book accommodation in advance. stop when you see somewhere nice. may/june/july doesn't matter. this is real travel so prepare for disappointment but also ecstatic joy when you find somewhere fabulous! don't forget road tolls, expensive in france, less so in italy, cheap in croatia, free in germany, flat rate ticket in switzerland and austria. the best thing about driving is that you can go to places other modes can't get you to. just explore, feel the freedom. for recommendations i'd say anywhere in switzerland, particularly east, or austria, trieste in italy on adriatic coast. lastly, driving through cities is a great adventure. the centre of paris by car is unforgettable. traffic is generally slow and well-organised. we've done paris, rome, budapest, prague, amsterdam, etc, etc. Great fun. parking is a minor problem, €20 per day approx in big towns/ cities (apart Amsterdam, €45). Andrea, a compatriot of yours, blogs about driving in europe at rearviewmirror.tv. or see driveeuropenews.com or drive-europe.co.uk.
have a Great Time, andy

I recommend you avoid driving in cities, as cars aren't necessary and are usually a big problem. Picking up a car in one country and returning in another is also VERY expensive. If you must have a car during portions of your trip, you could do a combination of car and train. Also, if you rent a car outside of Italy and Croatia, you might not be able to drive it to those countries. Your wish list of places is pretty long. You might think about paring it down a bit to be better able to enjoy the trip without too much time spent in transit and not enough spent actually enjoying where you are.

If you are starting in Holland and ending in Paris you could easily continue back to Holland to return the car, if there is a huge drop-off charge. You should also look into rental rates from Paris and Belgium. Sometimes there can be considerable differences in rates from country to country. The easiest way to get to London from the continent is on Eurostar, from Paris or Brussels (easy connection from most places in Holland). If you purchase 4 months in advance, you can get huge discounts on the train tickets to London.

Thank you all for your ideas, we r starting in Amsterdam as we will b there for a week with my son, then leasing a Peugeot as suggested , I had already looked into that one , I will check out the drop off fees , as yes we could easily travel back to Holland to drop off. We got our international drivers licences last week so that's all good. We want to go to Croatia as my sons girlfriends family are there and they will be coming with us. I will definitely look up that site , viaMichelin it sounds good. As asked before can someone suggest somewhere outside Paris to stay so we can get public transport in. Thanks again

Who are you leasing through? When I leased through AutoEurope I had to pay extra for picking the car up outside of France. We didn't have a choice about where to pick it up, as we already had our airline tickets and we were flying into Frankfurt. We were flying home from London, so we added Paris to our itinerary and dropped the car off there so we were able to avoid the extra charge for the drop off outside of France. I believe most leases are the same regarding extra charges outside of France. Maybe you can drop your car when you arrive in Paris. Then you could stay in the city center and not have to commute into the city. From Paris you could take the train to Calais or Eurostar from Paris to London.

Hi Tracey.My daughter organised International Driving Licence here in Adelaide through our local Royal Automobile Association. From memory cost was $30.
We have visited Europe 3 times and apart from not visiting Croatia, we have covered all these areas by train. Have you thought of this possibility? We usually stay a minimum of 3 nights.

You list countries, but not cities. If you a desire to visit rural areas, good for you. Too many people don't. But if, like most people, you are simply looking forward to seeing some famous cities, then you need to rethink the driving idea. Don't get me wrong, I like driving and I have done so in 20+ countries. But on our 4-6 week trips we have also organized cities and rural into separate blocks of time and not wasted time and money on a car in any city. Consider Paris, for example; You will spend a minimum of $50/day on a car you won't use - at all. You may have to pay for parking it. You will have to pay for a long Metro ride to get out to a location where you can safely park your car. Even though you are not using it, you will worry about it all day. In the evening, when Paris is most magical and perfect for an aimless stroll from your quaint city-center hotel, you will instead be riding the Metro for 30 minutes to get to your bland suburban hotel where you were able to park. All-in-all, that's $70-100/day in extra costs, 1-2 hours/day in wasted time and lots of wasted energy on something you are not even using. Now multiply this situation by the number of days you will be staying in EVERY city on your itinerary. We Americans have the same problem. We drive everywhere and have little trouble doing so, even in big cities. It's just so easy that we take it for granted. European cities do not work that way. When we plan an itinerary, the mode of transportation strongly dictates the route. It just makes life so much easier. On every trip we have ever taken, returning the car and entering the non-driving part of our trip is one of the happiest moments of the trip. That said, there are wonderful places to stay and linger outside of the famous cities, and for that, a car is ideal and for the most part, easy.

If you must visit Croatia, consider taking a budget flight instead of driving. Will certainly save you time and money. try whichbudget.com.

Randy said it very well. I would not stay outside Paris and commute in. Part of the magic of Paris, for me, is staying in the heart of Paris (4th, 5th or 6th arrondissement) and being able to walk to all the places I love. Paris is a very walkable city. That said, there are many options of where to stay outside Paris but the one I know well is St Germain-en-Laye, a very nice town where I grew up, a few miles west of Paris. The RER goes directly there from Paris. One of many options if you insist on staying outside the city.

Thanks Randy and Susan , yes We mainly wanted to see the rural areas , thus the car but I will look at losing the car before Paris.

Sarah thanks I'll look up the sight suggested

Thanks for all replies I have checked out the leasing cost through Peugeot the pick up and drop off costs are no different than if I drop off and pick up in Amsterdam the only difference would be if I p/up & d/off in France .The extra $300 australian dollars is less than the rail ticket for 4 of us from Amsterdam to London including car on Ferry.so we r still looking into it
There is no one way fee applied

We took a five week trip, starting in Amsterdam and ending in Rome. As usual I wish I had twice the time (or more) to cover the same ground. Our lodging stops were Amsterdam, Koln, Bacharach/St. Goar, Wurtzburg, Rothenburg, Reutte Austria, Munich, Salzburg, Verona, Venice, Modena, Cinque Terra, Florence, Orvieto, and Rome (I may have forgotten one or two). Day stops included Bonn, Dinklesbuhl, Nordlingen, Neuschwanstein, Wieskirche, Berchtesgaden, Hall in Tirol, San Gimignano, Siena, Pisa (and I'm sure some others that don't spring to mind). I think trying to get into the Dalmatian coast during your four weeks is going to be too much. We leased a Renault Grand Scenic II, for us and three kids (boys 15 and 11, girl 7), plus one carry-on each. It fit us about right, but wouldn't if we packed more or were bigger people. I agree with the others. When you get to a big city, park the car and leave it until you're ready to drive out. Make sure you have a reliable GPS for Italy, we didn't and lost a lot of time trying to equate road signs with our map. You need an international driver's permit for at least Italy and a window sticker (Carnette) to drive on Austrian autobahns (get it at the "truck stop" on the autobahn when you enter Austria).