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European road trip coming up

4K views 41 replies 14 participants last post by  Doric 
#1 ·
Driving through France and then on to the Swiss alps after that

Really looking forward to seeing what this car is like on a long ride.

Will try and get some nice pics of the car is the mountain passes but won;t be making it to the Stelvio pass this time round. Maybe next year.

Anyone done this before? The French police need require us to carry bulbs for the car. Anyone found a cost effective way of getting all the bulbs that would satisfy the Gendarmes ?
 
#2 ·
Halfords do kits with a selection of lamps. There won't be one which matches the Stelvio, but the Gendarmes won't know.

I've driven through France to Italy 2 or 3 times in most of the last 30 years and I'm yet to encounter a gendarme who's shown any interest in whether I'm carrying the kit the French law requires.

Andy
 
#3 ·
I've been pulled over by the French Police twice, once bringing a 1300 GT Junior back from Italy and once in a battered Vauxhall Zafira, on both occasions they never asked to see any bulbs or other requirements. Also on both occasions they escorted us off the motorway to some predesignated area with many Police waiting to greet us?
 
#5 ·
Being escorted to the next service area has happened to me twice in France though many years ago. I thought it was because I was speeding, but, in fact, they were douaniers not gendarmes (their uniforms are quite similar). After a cursory inspection the contents of my boot, I was allowed on my way.

Andy
 
#6 ·
For the last twenty years I have made sure I have had a full set of bulbs as the RAC state "Spare bulbs - by law you’re also mandated to carry a spare bulb kit for your vehicle, as the French police deem it necessary to replace it there and then on the grounds of safety." I wish anyone required to do so the best of luck given how hard it is to access modern headlights.

In all that time the only conversations I have had with the Gendarme is when the main road was closed and there was no indication of the diversion route other than said Gendarme waving traffic into the side road. When asked how to get to where we were heading his instructions were literally "follow that car in front he is going the same way"

In fact in twenty years I have only once found a bulb blown while on holiday and rather than do it myself I went to the local Citroen dealer, in the Austrian Tyrol, (it was a Xsara VTS) and they sent the apprentice out to fit the replacement as he had the smallest hands (and I suspect was the least able to refuse to leave his existing task). Being big on customer service they only charged for the bulb and not the fitting.
 
#9 ·
There is a list what you need to bring with you when you travel to france,

Danger triangle.
Yellow vests.
Alcohol tester.

Spair lamp set is an advice.
And there's no penalty for not having the alcohol testers.

Checking advice as I'm going through France and into Spain, Spain requires 2 warning triangles. And it's an offence to not indicate when you change lanes.
 
#12 ·
French Police does not have best reputation re. those who does not speak fluent French. One would have thought that what happened in WWII, would have made them - at least - positive re. UK- but not always so.

I would recommend a trip to France, be done before any hard B-day.
 
#13 ·
Recommend not to overspeed in all foreign countries, especially Switzerland. In France you need definitely yellow (red) vests (for each passenger?). In Switzerland you need in addition a triangel. The rest from my point of view you can forget. I never ever had a problem.
 
#15 ·
Many, many years ago, I was leading a test team from Sweden to north of Italy, where we were going to perform high speed tests on a test mule. Coming through Brenner Pass, we hit the border- no one there - everybody at lunch. Since we had a Carnet pass, with all our spares and tools, we had to get stamps from customs, that we did bring in those items.

We had to wait two hours. When customs arrived, it was a two minute affair.
 
#16 ·
There can be pros and cons of crossing an Italian border in the lunchhours. Your experience was a con.

Andy
 
#23 ·
No one yet mentioned that you MUST not have speed camera alerts on your sat nav in France, big fine, turn them off. Also driving in Switzerland you need a vignette to drive on the Mway, get it from Switzerland Travel Centre £35.50, its a must. Cars were being checked at the boarder in Basel last week when we came through. Speed cameras in France are often no where near as visible as those in the UK and I was surprised how many cameras have popped up in Italy this year.
 
#24 · (Edited)
The Stelvio's and Giulia's maps don't have speed camera locations in France. They just happen to have unspecified danger symbols and warnings near to speed camera locations.

The thing not to have in France is a speed trap detector. Those can get you into big trouble even if they are switched off.

I always buy my vignettes at the Swiss border. I see no need to buy them beforehand. Major Swiss border crossings have two lanes for those already with and those without vignettes. Petrol stations sell vignettes too if you happen to cross at an unmanned border crossing.

Andy
 
#27 ·
My understanding is that it's not ARUK assistance, but AR International Assistance. If you ring the 00800 number you get put through to an Italian helpdesk,

Andy
 
#31 ·
Got my Swiss motorway vignette already.

Also, my euro breakdown assistance is provided as part of my lease agreement but fingers crossed I don't have to use it

Someone showed me a newspaper article yesterday about the French police increasing their attention on speeding British drivers recently and there's been almost double the amount of DVLA owner detail requests from the French police for issuing of fines. I'll be going careful.
 
#32 ·
I've never been pulled or checked for anything - driving out again soon

I read somewhere yesterday something about Bluetooth handsfree phone use was forbidden now too in a bid to make things safer ??? Shocked !
Has anyone heard about that. TBH - I won't be disconnecting my phone.
Shouting at the kids in the back is more dangerous!
 
#34 ·
In relation to the question about beam deflectors, I asked my servicing garage today to recommend the correct solution (2018 Stelvio Super with Xenon headlamps). They rang Alfa - no idea. My chap said best not to stick anything on the plastic outer casing, but I'm none the wiser about how to fix the headlamps so they'll be legal on the continent. Any ideas?
 
#35 ·
I drive on the continent very little after dark so my habit is to have a set of Eurolites with me in case a Gendarme gets difficult. I did fit them to my Giulia on one trip. No sign of damage to the lights after having the Eurolites fitted for 10 days.

Used them many times on the 156 GTA without ill effect. They come off best if the headlights are warm. It is important to get all the adhesive off. I never needed to use any solvent.

I know of no other solution.

Andy
 
#37 ·
I forgot to post an update after starting this thread.

Main thing is, no trouble with any police of any kind. We got all the way from London down into Italy over the course of 8 days and spent some great time up in the Swiss mountains. Driven around France, Belgium and Holland before but it was our first trip down that far.

As I mentioned in another thread, my mpg is never great but I got 28mpg over 1500 miles which was lots of motorway but also some serious mountain passes which dragged the mpg back down a bit.

The car went like a dream and didn;t miss a beat. Very comfy cruising all the way for four of us n the car. Only one worry was following a camper van up the Great St Barnard pass - the engine temp started to go up a couple of notches. First gear climbing due to switchbacks and following slow traffic plus I guess the thinner air. We were up to about 2500m at that point. Little bit of brake fade when pushing on while making our way down the mountains too.

It was great to see so many other Stelvios in Western France, Switzerland and Italy. I must have counted about 20 Stelvios over that way.

Wierdest thing was while waiting in the Euro tunnel car park. I was one of three Stelvios parked within 5 spaces.

I did put the Eurolites on just in case.

Thanks fro all the replies when I posted this. A few pics to follow...
 
#42 ·
Happy to report that the Stelvio performed faultlessly on its nearly 2400 mile return trip to Italy, over 2.5 weeks. I do think the Stelvio looks right at home in the Italian landscape. Eurolites on the headlamps easily fitted and easily removed. The Telepass for the French tolls saved masses of time. The only incident was a reverse into a terracotta plant pot (pictured) which suggests that the rear parking sensors don't always pick things up!
 

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