Calis Beach and Fethiye Turkey Discussion Forum
Turkey Related Subjects => Turkey Discussion Forum (Not Calis specifically) => Topic started by: Shishcojackson on June 27, 2010, 21:02:14 PM
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I am planning to drive to fethiye from Colchester England, my plan is to take the euro tunnel train to france and drive through i think its belguim, luxemboug germany and find the ferry at Ancona italy - chesem drive then to fethiye i am told there is only one toll costing about 44 Euro, if any one knows and has travelled this way would you share your tips and advise with me the only thing i am unsure of is the Turkish border, are they as bad as people say, i plan on bringing, furniture, clothes and garden stuff, i am told not to bring any electrial things, beause they charge you tax is this correct.. Any help would be greatly recived please
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Please post new topics in the appropriate section - this one is for member introductions, you introduced yourself a while back now.
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I think you can bring used electrical items in now but if you have anything that can receive a TV signal you will pay banderol tax on it.
Fi
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Hi - I have travelled this route 10 times now. If you would like to e-mail me directly at xxxxxxxxxxxxxx I can let you have the directions I take plus other information :)
Edit: Email Address removed. Please do not post your private email addresses on public forums, it is a very bad idea. All members can be contacted via their CBF profile.
Also, on a public forum, information posted for all to see is the idea, not privately. Can you not post details in public for the benefit of many?
Thanks
Scunner
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Ok, sorry Scunner - will try and advise best I can. Firstly, unless you particularly wish to take the Ancona / Cesme route via ferry I would advise against it both from the cost point of view and also comfort. The ferry operating this route is old and slow ....... far better if you can to take the Ancona to Igouminista ferry (Superfast and Minoan operate daily) then travel across Greece and enter Turkey at Ipsala.
Recommended route cost wise is as follows:
Dunkerque
Lille
Charleroi
Namur
Luxembourg
Thionville
Strasborg
Offenburg
Freiburg
Basel
Lucern
Como
Milan
Piacenza
Parma
Bologna
Ancona ......... choose you ferry route but if you go via Greece then
Igoumenista
Ioannina
Grevena
Kozani
Veroia
Thessaloniki
Kavala
Ipsala ........ you're in Turkey
Kesan
Gelibolu
Canakkale
Izmir
Mugla
Fethiye
Tolls this route: French - about 10 Euro, Italian about 25 Euro, Swiss "Vignette" 30 Euro
It is NOT worth trying to bring electrical goods into Turkey ..... as far as I can assertain ALL electrical goods can be viewed as subject to import tax. Personal posessions are fine.
The customs at Ipsala have always been fair as far as I'm concerned.
I have the route in spreadsheet format including road numbers etc. but I'm sure that if you pump in various places to a Routefinder program they will give you this information.
Hope the above helps :-)
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Make sure that if you are driving a British car you put the plastic covers on your headlights to deflect the beam from dazzling oncoming traffic. If you are using Sat Nav you can put it on non toll roads for crossing Europe but be careful when nearing borders as you may want a toll road then.
The road from Igoumenitsa to the Turkish border is one long straight motorway but it has no services so make sure if you are using it to have plenty of petrol and some food and drink.You have to pull off into the villages otherwise and hunt for shops and garages.The motorway itself is very good and when we used it a couple of months ago no one was using it very much so it was quiet.It takes about seven and a half to eight hours to cross Greece on this road. Make sure when you land that you are programmed into toll roads or it will take you on a mountainouse route. The tolls booths were not working when we travelled on it,this may have changed.
We noticed that on the ferry to Igoumenitsa a lot of people who did not have cabins were equipped with blow up beds,sleeping bags,pillows,food and blankets.
Make sure you have a green card for your insurance,this is the first thing they asked for on the Turkish border and also the chassis number of your car and all your car papers. They never searched our car but that is not to say that they would not search yours.
The ferry ride across the Dardanells is very good and quite pleasant once you are in Turkey,costs about twenty three lira . There are two routes to choose from, both are fine. The toll road from Izmir to Aydin only costs about a pound.
We were told that if you enter Switzerland there is a charge for a years car tax there.I do not know this for sure. We drove across France into Italy via the Frejus tunnel and across to Italy from there. The Frejus tunnel was about 35 euros and took about twelve minutes to drive through, it is about eight miles long.
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I'd agree with all that Daffodil - thanks for adding
By the way, second-hand or used electrical goods ARE taxable and regardless of if you have the original receipt the value is what the Turkish authorities put on it !!!!!! ....... leave the flat screen at home lol
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Thanks for that. Am I right in saying that you have to pay for entering Switzerland? If so how much is it?
We crossed France on a combination of toll roads and non toll roads and found it very easy to drive through with loads of stopping places for a rest.I think that July and August are very busy on the roads across the continent compared to when we travelled. I would try to avoid the school holiday months if possible.
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Yes - it's the Vignette charge I mentioned of 30 Euros - it lasts for a year but there are no tolls on the majority of roads .... just a few tunnels but not on this route ....... probably spelt Vignette wrong but that's how it sounds ;)
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You must have residency to import household goods. Electrical stuff no longer attracts tax - however anything that receives a radio or television signal is subject to bandrole tax - a hifi/cd system will cost you 150 euros. A television the same. The car needs to be out of the country within 6 months and you cannot bring it back in afterwards. Good Luck - Enjoy the drive :-)
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Great reading, thanks for the postings, we are going to drive to Calis this summer, just in the process now of trying to sort car insurance, green card and road side assistance (just in case) any tips on this would be greatfully received.
Carol
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Yes it is all extremely informative stuff. Thanks all!
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France is a very large country to cross. There are hotel chains across the country. F1 are very basic with just a room and showers on each floor which are shared and self cleaning,they are cheap and clean with a breakfast bar in the foyer. B and B Hotels and Campanile are like a Travelodge and the Mercure chain is comfortable too. Chambre de hautes are becoming very popular and are family farm accommodation. In Italy the hotels are more privately owned. On the road signs it took me a while to realise that Turin is Torino in Italy!There is a hotel called the Davide in Rivoli which is comfortable and has a good restaurant nearby.There is also a pleasant family owned villa which is called Cascina Bella Vista and offers accommodation and breakfast which is on the route past Turin at a village called Brico Barrano in the Asti area.
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Before you enter Turkey fill your car with petrol as it is much cheaper in Greece. We were paying about 1.42 euros. At today's rate about about 1.15 sterling and much cheaper than turkey.
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Make sure you have the European motoring kit or you can be fined and also the EHIC health insurance card for Europe. :)
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Hi, Re the roadside assistance you might like to include ADAC,its a German based company but with very strong back up across Turkey as well as Eu.good luck
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This is something I'd like to do! I would imagine though that the Bulgarian route would be much quicker.
I wouldn't mind doing the German, Austrian, Slovakian, Bulgarian route into Istanbul going to Tukey and then coming back from Fethiye or Izmir and crossing on the ferry to Greece and then on to Italy and up through France.
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The Bulgarian and Greek routes are fun, especially when looking for direction signs, because they use different alphabets to us.
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Plus in Bulgaria the speed limit is 50kph on all none motorway routes and there is a speed trap on virtually every bend. We have done it once, never again, we will do the Greece route every time.
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It might sound like a daft question but did people who drove across Europe find that their European Satnav maps (for those who used satnav) were reliable and accurate? I find myself driving along a road that doesn't exist on screen every time I go to Edinburgh airport and was wondering if anyone had any confusion along this drive across the continent?
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We did not rely on the Sat Nav alone.We had a route planned and used maps as well.
On the roundabouts Sat Nav seems to be inconsistent on what it takes as a road exit,sometimes they just look like dirt tracks and sometimes it ignores them sometimes it doesn't.In France it wanted us to go along a road that had roadworks on and in situations like that we had to find another route for ourselves.With the way roads are being built it is a good idea to check the Sat Nav is up to date on its info I think. I would always take a good map as well as Sat Nav.When we left Greece and tried to switch Sat Nav on in Italy it would not work. It just says press this dot which we did and nothing happened.I wonder if because we switched it off in one country and turned it on in another it cannot change satellites,any suggestions?
Greece was so easy to cross, one straight road most of the way.I was surprised in Italy,the motorway roads were not that wide,two lanes a lot of the way. French roads are so well marked and not very busy. We are still tootling around France now!
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Sat Nav did not work very well in Turkey, when I got to the bottom of the Uzumlu hill it told me to turn LEFT towards Antalya! Once we crossed the border into Greece it woke up and worked perfectly all across Europe and the UK. Some things to remember though; Sat Nav is not perfect so take maps as well to verify the route it is taking you. Make sure you have your Sat Nav settings correct for the route you want to take, ie. avoiding toll roads, A roads only, motorways, speed camera warning etc etc. If you do not do this you may find you are being taken where you least expect it. Last thing, make sure you regularly update your Sat Nav.
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The problem with the sat nav we had was that the maps were not up to date. This really annoyed me as I bought it in Currys 2 weeks before we left. One place you need to be wary is around the Alps. Going through France we turned on the avoiding toll road option and when we got to the Alps the thing started directing us up the alps. I started to get worried when we had passed the ski lifts and we were still climbing. The final straw was when we started to find snow on the road. We turned round and turned off the toll road option.
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Thanks everyone for your comments - Our car has a built in sat nav - it should take us to the border of Turkey! However as we have only ever used it in Scotland and England it will be interesting to see how it works once we are in mainland Europe etc....
We are planning the route this week and have found all your comments helpful.
Will post our own findings once we return in September, (we leave the UK at the end of July)
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Good luck with your trip.
If you choose to enter Turkey at Ipsala and cross the Dardanelles there are two ferry crossings. The first you come to is from Gelibolu to Lapseki and the second one further along the coast is Kilitbahir to Cannakle.The Kilitbahir crossing has a large memorial to the war dead.
There is a good chance you will see dolphins playing in the waters here. It is a lovely sight and so much more enjoyable than seeing them in captivity.
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quote:
Sat Nav did not work very well in Turkey, when I got to the bottom of the Uzumlu hill it told me to turn LEFT towards Antalya!
Turning left at the bottom of Uzumlu hill and up over the mountain via Seki and Burdur, is the "quickest" route north (i.e. Ankara,Istanbul) not the shortest but the quickest because of the better roads.
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It might well be the quickest if you are going to Ankara or Istanbul but it's not the quickest route to Canakkale for the Ipsala border.
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If you use the RAC or AA route planner to go to anywhere in Southern Greece from Turkey they will take you by Istanbul and it is 6 hours longer than going by Canakkale.
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I have driven over twice in the same car and have been told via this site that you can only bring the same car in twice, with an over six month gap between each visit. however I have heard of people who have brought the same car in many times what is the true postion, is it law that the customs turn a blind eye to or are those who bring the same car in more than twice pushing their luck
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do any of these rules change if you want to do Fethiye-UK - Fethiye in a Turkish bought MB plated car.
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quote:
Originally posted by c1
I have driven over twice in the same car and have been told via this site that you can only bring the same car in twice, with an over six month gap between each visit. however I have heard of people who have brought the same car in many times what is the true postion, is it law that the customs turn a blind eye to or are those who bring the same car in more than twice pushing their luck
I think they may be telling you fibs, or very very lucky.
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quote:
Originally posted by Scunner
Please post new topics in the appropriate section - this one is for member introductions, you introduced yourself a while back now.
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quote:
Originally posted by Shishcojackson
quote:
Originally posted by Scunner
Please post new topics in the appropriate section - this one is for member introductions, you introduced yourself a while back now.
I am sorry i dont mean to post in the wrong places, i just seem to get it a bit wrong, i cant seem to find the replies if there are any to my questions,
Jackson
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We did it, took 4.5 days 47 driving hours and 2400 miles
Came through France, Holland, Belgium, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and then into Turkey.
The road through Romania was horrendous, roadworks all the way, took us 8 hours to do 200 miles! The viaducts along side the Danube are all in a state of 'disrepair' and the whole stretch is being resurfaced, stop and go boards all the way.
We have had 3 good weeks here in the Calis area and heading back to the UK on Sunday via Greece and Italy etc.
The information we took from the threads on this site were most helpful, thanks to everyone who posted.
Our 2 daughters were angels travelling down and not once asked the 'are we there yet'.
It opened their eyes as we travelled through Romania as to how their lives in the UK might not be so bad after all!
Liz - I can not access e mail through the lap top (not sure why) but all is ok as we speak with your complex.
Carol
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Good to hear that you did the journey and arrived safely. I hope that you have a good trip back via Italy etc. :)
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Remember a couple of important points.
The car can enter for 6 months but you will only get a 3 month visa.
The car details will be registered in your passport.
You can not leave the country without your car unless you impound it at customs.
After the car has been here for 6 months then it must leave and stay out of Turkey for 6 months.
Dont listen to friends of friends who say that you can keep your car here or can come in as many times as it wants. This is not true.
If you dont have a green card or your insurance only covers for European part of Turkey then you can purchase traffic insurance very easily from the border.
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Excellent topic, Thanks to all for posting, interesting information.
Please keep posting, I Am sure there must be thousands of little incidents along the way and loads more information we would all like to know about, price of petrol, breakdowns, hotels, campsites,food, loos, getting lose ect. :D
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There is a Burgher King open during the day just before you turn off for the Ipsala border crossing in Turkey.One of the first things you see when entering Turkey! :)
If you do enter Greece at Ipsala there are no services on the motorway across Greece.Komotini is a good place to pull off for a comfort break, there is a garage,supermarket with a little cafe and toilets there, at least in during the daytime.
Italy has plenty of services on the motorways.
In France the SuperU supermarkets sell petrol at 1.32 euros a litre,garages are about 10 cents a litre dearer. If you want to stop overnight in France a lot of French farms now do Chambre d'hotes accommodation which is bed and breakfast. They usually advertise with a little sign by the road somewhere. A very individual experience and gives you an insight to French farming life.
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Thanks Carol - glad you made it ok and have had a great holiday - safe journey back. We're out next Friday, can't wait.
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We made it back to the UK last Thursday, travelled back through Greece, (car ferry to) Italy and then decided to go back the Austria, Germany route. Although the Italian tolls were expensive it gave us chance to take the girls through the mountains! What a beautiful route - we thought the scenery in Scotland took some beating but this route was beautiful.
The new mountain pass in Greece is open although some of the tunnels are not quite finished.
Would we do it again, well hubby and Maddy yes - me and Jenny - well we loved it saw lots of sights. I would do it again but take longer, drove past too many cities and was not allowed to stop and take them in.
I was constantly reminded that "this is a drive to Turkey, not a tour of Europe"!
To everyone who posted on this site and topic with hints and ideas - thank you so much, I had my folder of info available should we have needed it.
We got stopped once - that was in Seki (on a day out) we took Dafodils route and took in the mountain passes. Beautiful. The police checked we had our green card, read it upside down looked at Marcs passport and waved us on!
Thank you
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I am glad that you enoyed the ride to Elmali and Kalkan. Did you see the huge dam?
Glad that you arrived home safely after your Europe trip. :)