Need help on driving tour in England
 

Several friends and myself are planning a driving tour of England next Sept. for about 3 weeks. Theres so much to see that we feel we need to select a certain area to visit for this trip. Any suggestions as we are in planning stage. And I am nervous about the wrong side of the road. I was just in Scotland this summer and those roads were very narrow. Is England's any better???

I visited England in 1999 and spent 1 week in London and then picked up a car to drive around England for the next 3 weeks. It was definitely odd to drive on the opposite side of the road (I seemed to always be hugging the curb) but not really scary (those round-abouts are quite wonderful). And, yes, there are a lot of narrow roads. I loved my trip and never got out of England proper. If you would like my trip report, please e-mail me directly. Honestly, if you can handle the driving it's the only way to go.

We just returned from a driving trip and found the roads in Cornwall and Devon to be more difficult than the rest of England. They were very narrow; cars just parked on the side and you had to go around them; the hedgerows prevented you from seeing some of the beautiful scenery; and there was no place to pull over to let people pass. It was "very interesting" to meet buses and trucks coming the other way. The Cotswolds, the Lake District and the Yorkshire Dales seemed to be easier, but driving on the left required complete concentration for my husband and was not very relaxing. I was the navigator and had to remind him to stay center when the hedgerows would threaten my side of the car.

I would highly recommend you invest in the very best road map you can find - a large coil ring book-type of map (check book some of the book sellers). It was our best friend! Also choose an automatic transmission, not a standard, so it will be one less thing to think about. And yes, the roads are narrow, but the cars are little too! <BR><BR>It was tense at times trying to get used to the roundabouts and driving on the "wrong side", but we loved the freedom of having our own wheels and were able to explore some wonderful out-of-the-way places.

Please excuse typo ... should read ... (check out some of the book sellers - not check book some ...)!

We drove extensively in England - and had a ball! It's very funny; the locals will always tell you that it takes longer than it does to get somewhere. We headed from Brighton to Bath and many said, "all in one day?????" but it only took us 3 hours!! <BR>One hint: we put a few paper signs in our windows with our country flag (Canada) and the words "foreign driver" and people were VERY nice - many let us in in traffic or just gave us the 'thumbs up' as encouragement!! it was also a great conversation starter at many of our stops!! Hope you have a ball!

Thanks for all the info...tell me, whats a roundabout? And someone suggested a driver's manuel. Where do I get that?

Mary, if you are familiar with small towns in the U.S. that have a courthouse in the center of a square where you drive one way around and can exit on roads in all four directions, a roundabout is somewhat like that except in a circle. If you miss your road sign, you can just go around again until you get it right. There are rules about entering in your turn.

Mary, we got full instructions on roundabouts etc. on the web. Just type in roundabouts, or UK driving etc. We printed it out - diagrams, descriptions etc. Actually, the info about the threee different colour directional signs were VERY useful for us. Good Luck!

A roundabout is a traffic circle, called "rotaries" in some parts of the U.S. The key is to use the sign before the roundabout to know exactly which exit you want before you get in. Then yield to traffic coming from your right that is already in the circle. They're a little intimidating at first, but I found them fun after a while.

Here's a few web sited for driving in the UK. Hope their helpful!<BR><BR>http://www.jackdaw.u-net.com/ukfaq/ukdrive.html<BR><BR>http://www.eastmead.com/driving_uk.htm<BR><BR>http://www.roundabout.net/DIBhome.html<BR><BR>