You see the same kinds of vehicles and you definitely get to your destination much faster using them, but they don't go everywhere. Driving in France was enjoyable except when we got stuck in some traffic jams. I had read that it was impossible to navigate Aix-en-Provence, but that was a piece of cake compared to trying to get through Arles. It was so exasperating that I didn't even take any pictures.
If you click on the link above, you will get more detail on the kinds of roads and road rules we faced. I will call your attention to a couple of significant signs in the next post.
So here we are traveling along on the autoroute just south of Paris heading toward Giverny.
Things were going well until we started getting close to the city.
There was no way we were going to get a speeding ticket in this mess. Note the motorcycle to the right.
Things loosen up a bit and he's much farther ahead. This maneuver is perfectly legal in France and most of Europe.
But eventually, the line of motocyles gets slowed down, too.
This looks awful, but it was nothing compared to Arles and it went much faster.
I took this picture at our first stop for diesel, or gazoil or gazole as it is sometimes called. Unfortunately, the numbers aren't very clear. The price per liter was 1.41 euros. At the time we were there that was about $1.83 per liter or roughly $6.96 per gallon. We are such whiners in this country...
This was the road sign by the gas station where we stopped. Please notice that there are no road numbers or letters here, just directions to towns. We encountered very few stop lights. Traffic was handled with traffic circles like this one. Except for the dreaded Arles where there were both.
This is what the gas station looked like. Trout went in on his own and got the key to the toilet.
This is driving on the main street into Le Mans, the city. There was lots of construction and we loved these signs indicating crosswalks.
But sometimes they got lost in all the other signage. Here you can see a Pietons arrow as well.
Here is Trout pumping diesel again. This was on our way south.
More construction, of course.
We're both a little wacky, but whether we're here or overseas, we like seeing what the truckers are hauling.
And the milirary convoys.
I chose these pictures for an end to this post. This is from our room at the CDG Hilton. We didn't have our car then. We took the train and a hotel shuttle from the airport to the hotel. The shuttle took us back the next day for our flight. We loved this growing roof over the bus station.
And the next day we were in a totally different kind of traffic.
