hopingtotravel

It's looking more and more like there will be several places on the planned trip that all our luggage will be in the trunk while we are touring chateaus, museums, gardens or whatever. Do the car parks for these places have any sort of security personnel? Are they so busy (in April/May) with people coming and going that it's OK? Obviously I'm talking about places where we are nowhere near our hotel and cannot drop luggage off there first. That is not an option. Spending an extra overnight in each of these areas is also not an option.

ira

Hi hop,

Can you give us a hint about where you will be?

hopingtotravel

Places where this might be a concern would be: Vezelay, Menerbes, Senanteque, Giverney (both at garden and at American museum), maybe Aix, maybe a Loire Valley chateau.

BoulderCO

We have been in this situation many times and it always makes me very nervous. My best advice is 1.Be sure to have a rental car where your luggage will not be visible (a trunk versus a hatchback). 2. Do not leave any obvious signs that you are a tourist such as maps, guide books, etc. visible in the car. 3. Do leave a local newspaper visible in the car. 4. Do not leave passport, credit cards, etc in the car. 5.Try to park in a visible open area of the car park, not obstructed by walls, shrubs, etc.

hopingtotravel

I like the 'local newspaper' idea. On another thread I read where someone bought a local magazine to keep their map in when they walked down the street. Actually I have done the 'luggage at car park' thing in England and Ireland. I had friends whose car was broken into in New Zealand. They think they were actually followed from their hotel. I don't do it in Hawaii, but you're never more than 35+ mi from your hotel there!

isabel

When I first heard about the "local newspaper" idea I thought it was pretty good, but apparently most rental cars have different plates or something which identifies them as such so "good" thieves can spot them anyway.

Besides not leaving luggage visible - which is definitly the most important thing I'll add a couple other suggestions. Try to park in fairly busy lots - with people coming and going there is less opportunity for someone to break in.

The other is to not open your trunk (to put things in or take them out) once you get to the place where you are parking the car. Sometimes thieves will watch parking lots and if they see you putting stuff in your trunk, and see the luggage, etc in it, then they'll know your car is one worth breaking into. Just stop somewhere and get out what you need before you get to the lot where you'll be leaving the car.

Patrick

Ah, Isabel has hit the idea I was getting ready to post. I can't believe the number of times I go somewhere like the beach and see people stand there for ten minutes trunk open, stashing all their good stuff amongst the whole trunk full of luggage. I'm not sure why they don't just put up a big sign and arrow saying, "Look here, thieves".

If there is a guard or attendant, I always speak to them, making sure they are aware which car is mine. Maybe it's a false sense of security but I feel they're likely to say something if a stranger goes near my car.

traveldawg

You are getting good advice on the car parking.

My wife and I have made many driving trips in Europe. The one thing we try to do is get a car that has a trunk that will hold all our luggage out of sight. That is the single best thing you can do. We have never had a problem when we do that and we have been all over.

Another tip: Always drive with your 4 doors locked. We had friends that were stopped at a light in Italy behind another car. These guys on a scooter pulled up next to them. The guy not driving opened the passenger door, took the wife's purse that was on her lap, and they drove away. The purse had passports and cash plus plane tickets. There was no way to follow the scooter as their car was stuck in traffic.

SeaUrchin

Friends of mine tip the attendant and actually tell him or show him that the rest of his tip will be his if the car it ok on their return.

I sort of have mixed feelings about this, but they swear by it and I have been with them when they did it. So far so good.

Underhill

In many areas of Provence you will see warning signs advising tourists not to leave anything visible in their cars. It's a big problem with the limited availability of cars with real trunks, but our system is to use those long combination locks to hook all the bags together--makes it much more difficult for someone to walk away with them as opposed to one bag only. It's not a bad idea to pick up a cheap blanket to throw over the pile.

Not many car parks have attendants; if they do, it's for taking payment for parking.

hopingtotravel

Fantastic! I haven't seen the 'link everything together' idea. I'm fully expecting someone here to say the attendant who takes a tip to watch your car will take a bigger tip to point out which ones have luggage! (sorry, my brain is clogged from reading about the people who dropped the iron on their carpet). I'm used to doing all the "keep your stuff not visible" because our health club parking lot suffers break-ins. I guess what I was really curious about was if these places are so very, very busy (during daylight hours) with come and go traffic that it would discourage break-ins.

SeaUrchin

Ha, I agree, I thought of that too. They just say to him, it is not a good car but we don't want to walk home, ha ha ha, here is some money, watch the car and there will be more later.

I like the idea of linking all of the cases together too, I think I will do that too.