Driving to amsterdam- help with ferry and driving

BernadetteN

I live in Dover and travel to France to get to work.

I would reccommend Norfolkline Dover-Dunkerque. You can get a night rate of £19, £24 off-peak daytime, £29 peak daytime, all one way fares, if you book before 31st January 2006 (but I've found these closinng dates on special fares often get extended).

Norfolkline are also doing good value multi trip amendable fares, also book by 31st January. For example, 3 returns cost £165, 4 returns £400, 5 returns £225.

By travelling with Norfolkline to Dunkerque, the journey may be an our longer than P&O and Seafrance to Calais, but the road journey is a half hour less as Dunkerque is on the way to Belgium. The other advantage of Norfolkline is that they do not carry coaches and therefore no long queues for the restaurant or shops and the car passenger lounge is usually quiet.

It should take you around 4 41/2 hours to Amsterdam, just watch traffic can be heavy around Antwerp.

Diesel price in Calais this week was €1.04 at Carrefour Cite Europe (but it's in the wrong direction, except for Eurotunnel crossings). There's a Centre Commercial on the outskirts of Dunkerque (?Grand Synthe).

Bernadette

TerryTowelling_2

LB1985 wrote:

Just to be pedantic, Dunkerque is France, not Belgium.

Another option, which would probably minimise driving, is taking Stena Line from Harwich to Hook of Holland. The only thing is when we travelled on their HSS (High-Speed Sea Service) years back, it was quite expensive, although this was in peak summer.

Oops, that's right, it is. I did mention the Harwich crossing though :-)

I'm thinking of doing the Harwich/Hoek crossing myself next time even though it's so expensive as it's pretty tiring trip via France (I travel every few months to South Wales from the Netherlands, which is 10-12 hours door to door via Dunkerque, Calais or Boulogne).

Cyclists, yes, watch out as they're everywhere and often have right of way. Especially watch out for roundabouts as you often have to give way before you enter the roundabout and also as you leave. And watch out for traffic coming from the right, as if it doesn't tell them they have to give way then they have priority over you.

Never stayed in Almere, but a search turned up this hotel http://www.bookings.net/hotel/nl/anno_almere.en.html?aid=200046 . It's no recommendation though. I've assumed you mean Almere-Stad, the main centre, as Almere is a pretty big spread out kind of place with different areas.

paja

Thanks for all your feedback on this and i have now decided what i will do.

Booking with Norfolkline dover to Dunkerque(£48 return) and i have located a hotel north of amsterdam (£55 night for twin) where i need to be called Bastion in almere - unless any one has any negatives about norfolkline and the Bastion hotel.

I would like to break the jounrney and stay somewhere just inside france or belgium. anyone recomend any hotels? or villages. even hypermarkets

also are the main roads toll roads A16, A10, A14 etc.

thanks for your help.

gooismeid

Re: driving in NL, once you get out of Belgium you'll find signs to Amsterdam pretty straightforward and the motorway network is pretty good. There are no toll roads. If at all possible, park OUTSIDE amsterdam if you want to visit and get the tram in - driving in a'dam is for deathwish merchants and those with not enough stress in their lives.

As for eating in Almere, I will only say that my own personal seventh circle of hell is reserved for all the second rate modern architects who practised their black arts on the poor residents of Almere - it's a bunch of unrelated suburbs with no heart, no soul, no beautiful buildings and very little in the way of reasonable restaurants. Park up, get the train into Amsterdam and go to van Puffelen on the Prinsengracht, or Staalmeesters on Kloveniersburgwal. If you don't want to bother with Amsterdam, try Huizen, Naarden or Bussum, all of which are lovely little towns within half an hour of Almere by train or by car, with history, architecture, and nice restaurants. Veel plezier!

webchimp2005

Hi,

Don't know whether this helps, but http://www.sagaholidays.co.uk/driveline/
has 50% of P&O ferries at the moment, just posted a new topic on it.

It might be cheaper.

Thanks

Webchimp

paja

Hi

well just to let you all know that i was very pleased with how much the travel cost.
Ferry £54 with Norfolkline and they even allowed me to change return as i needed to be there longer.
fuel cost around £30 to drive from Dunkirk to almere and the roads were a dream.
diesel in Bruge was 0.97euro a litre at a self serve station with credit card pump.

Not really fair to include hotel costs as this would be personal choice on what you wanted although i did find eating costs more than in the UK.

so altogether with ferry and driving over there it cost less than 100£ to get to amsterdam. well pleased.