My wife and I will be driving from Barcelona to St. Remy this coming July. We have driven through Italy in the past. The trip appears to be 4-5 hours on good roads. What has the experience been like, driving NY to Washington DC??

Sometimes delays at the border, congestion around Perpignan, almost all freeway (not free), lots of vineyards, driving into the sun if you leave in the morning, and quite boring.

Stu Dudley

Well...I think 4-5 hours it's pretty optimistic. I would better count on 6-7 hours minimum, if you do it in less time..lucky you

Hi

I drive in this area frequently.

It is about 450km, with 400km on the highway (toll about Euro 30).

Avoiding rush hour traffic, holiday weekends, etc - the best time you could expect would be around 4hrs 30. So allow 5hrs.

With the increasing use of radar cameras, it would be unwise to try and do it faster.

BTW, the border is pretty well unmanned these days, and it is extremely rare to be stopped.

Peter

We had been considering a similar trip in August of '09. We have to be in Barcelona for a convention and are thinking of heading to Provence afterwards.

Vueling has fligts from Barcelona to Nice, but their website (for me) is bulky and I can't quite figure out pricing.

I wonder if flying, if the the price is right, and then renting a car in France, would be comparably priced to renting in Barcelona and dropping off in France.

skipmd: have you looked into flying?

I think there is a no-train-change train to Montpellier.

Stu Dudley

Before you commit to anything, check on the one-way rental drop charges. When we visited Barcelona last year, I found that to pick up a rental car in Barcelona, in drop it in France (in Brive) would cost us about $400 in drop charges.

As we planned to drive throughout the Languedoc region, we ended up taking a convenient train from Barcelona to Perpignan, France, and picking up our rental car there.

Thank you for all your suggestions. There is train service to Montpellier, but it is a 4.5 hour trip and then we would have to drive to St Remy. We were planning on staying in St. Remy for a week and using our car to explore the area. There is a high fee if the car is left in France, but we are planning on driving back to Barcelona for our flight home. Flying into Nice or Marseille is the other option and renting a car at the airport, but I am not sure this will be any quicker.

If you're planning to drive back to Barcelona, that's a lot of pretty ugly driving. Personally, I'd count on 6 hours each way, but that's because the Autoroute du Sud has a way of totally confounding me around Montpellier every time I drive it. And if there are winds, and there often are, I get totally ooked out about the driving.

I'd look into flights or trains, personally.