[Uprasenjit]

Originally Posted by nsubrama2

Prasenjit, really enjoyed the picturesque sceneries and the excellent narration of your eventful trip!

Driving outside India can be quite a challenge for those driving for the first time...

I learnt that the hard way

Even I learned the hard way too. One of my navigation devices were not working once and we were stuck for almost an hour in a national forest. Then a car showed up and we were rescued.

In UK there are no right turns. All the exits are on the left. So actually there are no U turn other than the roundabouts.

Originally Posted by Samba

That's a great initiative Prasenjit.
The pics are awesome.
The writing is informative.
The pointers on self driven car rentals will be really helpful for people like me to plan up there future trips.
Thanks a lot for sharing and rated a well deserved 5*.

Hope this thread will be updated time to time and other bhpian's will also pour in with there valuable inputs, so it can really become a mini guide book for UK travelers.



I was in state level, you went international!

Thank you. You are always an inspiration.

Originally Posted by rajivrt

Boy, what a great thread to start. I have driven extensively in the UK and we desperately needed a thread like this. Once posts start pouring in, and perhaps some pictures on the road manners and driving, who knows, we might just be able to make that slight difference in the way we drive on Indian roads.

But first of all, a great post, and some beautiful pictures. Cross country driving in the UK is a beautiful experience...

Oh, if only a small percentage of road sense would prevail in India, I would be so proud to say from the heart that I love driving in India too!

Thank you. I hope to update this thread periodically. And also want others to provide input.

Its very difficult to follow rules when the population is huge and everyone is in hurry.

Originally Posted by diyguy

Was in the UK earlier this month and driving on the M4 is not that great. They have too many congestion delays and speed traps that one cannot really enjoy the drive. They also have far fewer rest areas than possibly India too. Also saw a horrific crash where a car had rear ended another which had spun and gone off the road. The top was flattened out and it was being cut to extract someone. A two hour drive became three and a colleague missed his flight from heathrow due to this. I agree on the rules bit etc but there is better infrastructure and road quality in many other countries far surpassing the ones in the UK. No offense just my personal experience.

The M1 and M4 are a mess during office hours. My clients never comes to office on Friday to avoid the traffic jams. They work from home.

One a lighter note - Indian roads have rest area where ever you want them to be. But thats not the case in a first world country. There are both positives and negetive points of having so less rest areas.

Originally Posted by sanjoy50

Your log is rich with valuable and practical inputs for everyone wishing such a trip. Do these rental agencies insist on medical insurance prior to handing over the vehicles
?

Thank you. Regarding medical insurance - No, they have never asked me or even mentioned about insurance. Most of the British or Immigrants are covered under NHS. NHS is not an insurance but its free. You have to register yourself for NHS.

[BlackPearl]

Originally Posted by sanjoy50

Your log is rich with valuable and practical inputs for everyone wishing such a trip. Do these rental agencies insist on medical insurance prior to handing over the vehicles
?

Sanjoy Da, medical insurance is not needed for renting a vehicle in UK. You need to provide an address proof and a credit card. Debit card cannot be used for renting a vehicle.

[AJ-got-BHP]

Brilliant Thread Informative and the pictures are just mesmerizing !!

Is this the reason why your Team-BHP Handle is 'U'prasenjit

[rajivrt]

Originally Posted by Uprasenjit

Its very difficult to follow rules when the population is huge and everyone is in hurry.

Agreed reluctantly. However, I am sure a vast majority just do not know the rules. Nor do the traffic constables. I have seldom comes across a driver who really knows the 'right of way'. I am amazed as to how many people stop at roundabouts to give way to the person on their left, and drive unabashedly through when then there are motorists on their right.

In the UK you just cannot be found standing on the middle of an intersection. There are yellow boxes in the middle where you cannot be found stalled, whatever be the reason. The result is that intersections there are never a madhouse like we see in India as soon as a traffic signal goes kaput. Everyone from all directions will just butt their nose in, creating all round chaos- most times they are the ones who get stuck the longest in the middle!

Originally Posted by Uprasenjit

The M1 and M4 are a mess during office hours. My clients never comes to office on Friday to avoid the traffic jams. They work from home.

.

Isn't M25 their big London car park? Didn't they widen M1 to 12 lanes for quite a way around London/outskirts?

[kopakabana]

Originally Posted by Uprasenjit

In UK there are no right turns. All the exits are on the left. So actually there are no U turn other than the roundabouts.

This is not Right (pun intended ) No right turns on motorways off course, but the A & B roads in the UK are full of right turns.

I would also like to clarify that the driving rules are same across UK, and no different in Scotland apart from a few more rights given to motorway agencies in England to stop offenders.

[teknophobia]

Couple of things I'd like to add. Easirent is the cheapest right now and as long as you keep within 10% of the posted speed limits, you don't have anything to worry about. The worst are the various councils, since traffic tickets are one of their biggest sources of revenue, they try to make sure you can't make out restrictions. I have paid nearly 250 pounds in various fines till now

But on the whole I find driving in the UK much easier than driving in India.

[aamateen46]

Thanks Uprasenjit for starting this thread. Couldn't have come at a better time! I have recently arrived in the UK (thanks to my IT roots &#128578 and was searching for pointers in car hire. Your information is very helpful.
As everyone said, the way people follow traffic rules in UK is amazing. Especially when it comes to treating pedestrians. You only need to stand at the edge of the footpath, glance at the oncoming traffic and everyone stops for you to cross the road. I am pretty sure this may have never happened in India ever 😀.

[Uprasenjit]

Thank you. I am no getting enough time to write few more travelogues. I will do update this thread this weekend I guess.


Theres one thing that we do not have in India - "Pedestrian priority Lights". These are yellow lights usually seen near Hospitals, Bus stands, train stations, parks or any crowded areas. They has marking like zebra crossing. If you find such lights you can cross the road any time you want and you dont have to wait for empty streets. Whereas if theres car coming they will stop for you. And until you have crossed the street cars wont cross the zebra crossing.

Courtesy Google

[BlackPearl]

Originally Posted by Uprasenjit

Theres one thing that we do not have in India - "Pedestrian priority Lights". These are yellow lights usually seen near Hospitals, Bus stands, train stations, parks or any crowded areas. They has marking like zebra crossing. If you find such lights you can cross the road any time you want and you dont have to wait for empty streets. Whereas if theres car coming they will stop for you. And until you have crossed the street cars wont cross the zebra crossing.

In India, the pedestrian priority lights would always be on

[ramkya1]

Wonderful logs and story. Reminded me of my End-to-End drive in UK a few years back, I did an extensive Tlog here too:

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/travel...end-end-4.html

We also covered the lake district and the Honister pass circuit, but missed many places you did. Covered Scotland a lot with Skye Island, and also loved the lake district, the best of UK, in my opinion. Some of the places you have covered are very interesting, maybe next time we did the East cost of UK, which we are planning.

We also did an end to end in New Zealand after that, the story:

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/travel...d-end-end.html

Just got back home after a 3 week drive in Ireland, we did all the 4 ends of the mainland and also Northern Ireland, was a whale of a trip. Thinking of writing a T log on that too!

Looking for ward to more posts from you and those lovely photos!

--Ramky

[Uprasenjit]

Peak District and Moors National Park

I was out of town for few months and busy so couldnt update this thread. I think its time I should add some more places to this thread.

It is very hard for me to find a new place every time. Most of the cities are already covered so we try to find remote country sides to visit. Everyone is already aware of the fascinating english country sides. The old small houses in the villages are beautiful. They have their own pattern and unlike the towns or cities they are mostly empty, which means very few people live there and ofcourse you wont get any Indian restaurant or a McDonals here. You can get a taste of traditional things if you wish to.


After a lot of research I decided to visit Peak District and Moors National Park during Christmas. Peak district is one of the first national park in the UK. The majority of economy is tourism here. Its is mostly a moorland with few peaks which are round in shape. Peak district is very close to Manchester. Moors national park also is a moorland, it has the largest expanses of heather moorland. Moors has cliffs and sea on the right side. We included Moors so that we could get to see some beaches and cliffs too along with the country side.

We get a long weekend this time every year which must not be wasted at any cost. However holidays in Christmas has one major problem - most of the shops/eateries remains closed. If not in a city then most of the pubs and other eateries only allows people who have prebooked.

Without any delay we booked rooms in the nearest towns of Peak district and Moors a week before the Christmas. There was very less staying places in both the places and both being remote areas we didn't take risk. The nearest towns were Sheffield and Peterborough.

Day 1- We started on Christmas morning. Our plan was to visit Peak district first as it was nearer than the other. December is usually very cold in the UK. But this years Christmas was the warmest recorded followed by chilly and windy and almost sub zero temperature for 2 days. Our travel plan was something like this-

I will try and describe each places this time instead of writing what we did on the entire 3 days trip.

DoveDale - This was the first place we visited in Peak District. Our rented car which was a Toyota Avensis had a weird sat nav. The navigation always worked correctly but it used to take us on the road less traveled by motorists. The roads were apparently empty and I doubt someone ever take them once in a while. But they were beautiful and we could just stop anywhere to click photos. Dovedale is a small valley with the river Dove flowing in between. People usually treks to the top of the valley to get a nice view of the river.

We trekked a little bit to see the river from top. But the wind at this time didnt let us to be on the top for long. We could only manage few snaps and then had to come back.

Our travel plan was extensive but due to no availability of food it became a pain. After Dovedale we stopped at Bakewell and looked for food everywhere. Most of the pubs were closed and the opened ones were not allowing us. Hopelessly we took some chips and cold drinks and waited to go to Sheffield. But how can anyone not enjoy the beauty knowing that we might not come here again. So we decided to cover as much as we could with our empty stomachs.

Solomon's Temple - Its an old landmark tower build in 18th century. Most of the tower is broken. What makes it special is the view of the surrounding landscapes from the top. When we reached the temple we could hardly stand. Being on the flat area and with no obstacle around the wind was worse.

Time was running out and we decided to visit one last place which would be on our way to hotel - Chatsworth House. Its a stately home of Derbyshire. It is the seat of Duke of Devonshire and has been home to Cavendish family since 15th century. With a lot of grounds around and river Derwent just flowing in front this house the place was more than beautiful. If someone ever dreamt about owing a large house in the country side I am sure this would be the house to dream about. The palace has its own golf court and river, and not to mention sheeps and ducks roaming around. The backside was a small hill.

In the evening there were no energy left in our body to go anywhere else other than the Hotel. Fortunately the Sheffield Metropolitan Hotel was just in town center and there were lots of restaurant open that time. As soon as we reached we checked in and went for food. We ate like horses.

To be continued..

[AKSen2015]

Thank you Prasenjit da for this beautiful post . It's indeed a pleasure to read this

[Uprasenjit]

I am reviving this old thread because I am back to the UK.


I am staying in Ipswich this time, its around 100 miles from London, to the east. What I have here is lots of beaches. There are atleast 10 beaches within 50 mile radius. The nearest city we have is the Cambridge, so naturally that was the first place we went


Cambridge

I dont have to give any introduction of Oxford and Cambrdige. Cambridge is a small city, so you will probably need a day to cover it. We (very lazy) started from Ipswich at 2pm after having lunch and reached Cambridge at 3pm. If you love history and science then Cambridge has lot to offer you. The colleges are historical and mighty. Cambridge is on the river Cam hence it has punts. The weather was all good and sunny, so we took a boat ride. We sat back, relaxed and enjoyed the ride. The ride is along the college backs, the guide will tell you interesting history of the colleges and its students. It was a good experience. The charges are different for punts, our was 15 pounds on a shared boat.

We roamed around for an hour or two after the ride, had some coffee and crepes, came back home around 9-9:30. The small city has few cafes and pubs. We didnt particularly wish to go into one of the colleges, we were pretty late too.

[Uprasenjit]

Now that I am getting some time off I can start contributing to this thread more often. After Cambridge we have been to Cotswold, Lake District, Peak District, Scotland (again), a few of the nearby beaches, Cornwall, Devon etc. So there is plenty to write. I will start with Cotswold because of that one of my favorite cute little villages.

COTSWOLD

England has many beautiful villages and Cotswold may be top of that list. If you search beautiful villages then chances are a picture from Cotswold will pop up. In the last 3 years we have been there twice. Once before Megh was born and once when he has 5 months. Both times in different cars and different seasons. The place offers plenty no matter where you go.

This is one of the AONB (Area of natural beauty) in England, which means it is preserved. They don’t even let you fly drones here. COTS is near central, between Oxford and Bath/Cardiff. From Ipswich, like all other places, it is 3 hours drive.

There's plenty of places where you can stay in Cotswold. You can stay inside the AONB in many small boutique hotels, Airbnb etc, or just outside in a city like Gloucester. In any case it's better if you have a car or transport of your own. The area is mostly small villages that have a certain look. Cotswold is built on yellow limestone hence most of the buildings are yellowish in color. Out of many small villages, these 3 are the most common and beautiful places you can visit –
1. Birbury
2. Bourton-on-the-water
3. Castle Combe

The drive within Cotswold itself is very scenic. Winding roads through the village will make you stop and take pictures often. The first time we stayed in an Inn. It was on top of a pub in a remote village. The pub only had local visitors but even there we found chicken tikka rice. No wonder it was once voted the best dish in the UK. The second time we stayed just outside the AONB because we had other plans outside Cotswold. But if your primary destination is Cotswold I will suggest taking one of those beautiful Airbnb’s just beside the lakes.