Tag: france

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Driving and charging in France and Belgium

So last week I took the Funky Cat on a driving holiday to France with a side trip to Belgium. I had planned to use the Funky Cat last year on a similar holiday to France and Germany however that didn’t work out as the Funky Cat was stuck with the dealer getting updated at that time, so I did that trip in a Nissan Juke.

This time though I was able to take the Funky Cat. We were staying just outside Calais, so the overall distance of around 240 miles plus a ferry crossing. With a range of 175 odd miles I knew that I would need to charge up on the way.

I left Weston with a 100% charge and made our way to Dover. I did originally plan to stop at Reading Services, but in the end kept going until we reached the Cobham Services on the M25. They have both Ionity and Gridserve chargers there, both costing in the region of 79p per kWh. I put on a good charge there using the Ionity charger, which took two attempts to get charging, and I left the car to charge whilst I had a coffee. After we charged (and finished the coffee) we then headed down to Dover. There I added a small extra charge at the Tesla chargers in the St James Retail Park while we grabbed some snacks.

There was no issues with the ferry crossing, except I did get a notification on my phone (from the car) that the vehicle had moved abnormally. It said please check if it is stolen or collided. Well it was quite a rough crossing, so I think that was it.

Upon arrival I drove to the campsite and checked in.

Later that evening I saw that the local Lidl had EV charging available and it was just €0.39 per kWh which is significantly less than most super fast chargers in the UK. The next day I charged the Funky Cat from the Lidl charger. It took a little time to sort out and I had to use the Lidl app to set the charge going and the Lidl app decided to localise and only use French. I managed to sort out the app and payment and I set the Funky Cat on charge. So I did some shopping and was able to get a decent charge on the car. Later times I saw French motorists charge there who were obviously not shopping at Lidl. I did charge at Lidl a few times when we were there in France all without issue.

On one of the days on the holiday we drove to Bruges in Belgium. Upon arrival we parked in the underground parking garage ‘t Zand and there were charging facilities there as well, they had 65 charging stations for EVs. The charging used the Charge Assist app which, though I don’t recall installing, I did have on my phone. It took a couple of attempts to charge, but mainly because I picked the wrong charger on my first attempt. Also due to the vagaries of the mobile connection, I wasn’t sure if it was working until I was above ground. These were 22kW chargers so slower, but perfect for charging the Funky Cat whilst we spent the day in Bruges.

I also found that there were two charging stations on the campsite, these were 22kW chargers, but they required a €75 holding charge which I thought was extortionate for charging, so didn’t use those.

After leaving the campsite I did hope to use a charger at the Cité Europe Shopping Center which we had planned to stop at, however we didn’t find any (easily, though I am sure if we looked harder we may have found some).

Having caught the ferry home to Dover, I put the Funky Cat on charge at the St James Retail Park while we had some refreshments. This gave me sufficient charge to get to the westbound Reading Services on the M4, where I did an additional charge with the Tesla chargers there. No idea why there are only Tesla chargers at the westbound services and none at the eastbound, what’s that all about?

Overall charging the Funky Cat on this holiday was relatively stress free and I had minimal range anxiety. Unlike the last time I drove back from Dover what with road closures meant at one point I was down to a 1% charge. This time however, all was well, and I would be happy taking the Funky Cat back to Europe in the future.

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Roaming in France, oh and Belgium

Following issues with using data in Portugal a few years ago with excessive data usage on my iPhone, I did wonder if I should follow the  same process I had used in October 2023 when I went to Amsterdam, last year when I went to Europe, and when I went to Helsinki in February.

The process I would use is go into Settings -> Mobile Data and turn off virtually all the apps which could use mobile data.  I would turn off mobile data for virtually all my apps and also specifically iCloud Drive and iCloud Backup. I am pretty sure they were the culprits for my excessive data usage whilst in Portugal. This time I only turned off mobile data for iCloud Drive and iCloud Backup.

This trip was a six day trip to France, with a one day excursion to Bruges in Belgium.

However on my final day I ran out of data, having used the 12GB of fair use data. I had to spend £6 adding a single day of unlimited roaming data. Always a challenge to work out what app or process was the culprit, but I think it may have been Photos and iCloud. I also used the phone extensively for CarPlay.

On the side trip to Belgium, my phone did automatically switch to the Belgium mobile network, and switched back when we returned to France.

One interesting thing that did happen when we visited Cap Gris-Nez which is the bit of France closest to the UK was that my phone did switch to the UK network before switching back to a French network when we moved away from the cliff edge.

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Roaming in Belgium, oh and France

Following issues with using data in Portugal a few years ago with excessive data usage on my iPhone, I did wonder if I should follow the  same process I had used in October 2023 when I went to Amsterdam, last year when I went to Europe, and when I went to Helsinki in February.

The process I would use is go into Settings -> Mobile Data and turn off virtually all the apps which could use mobile data.  I would turn off mobile data for virtually all my apps and also specifically iCloud Drive and iCloud Backup. I am pretty sure they were the culprits for my excessive data usage whilst in Portugal. This time (as an experiment) and as I was away only for a short time, I only turned off mobile data for iCloud Drive and iCloud Backup.

This trip I was taking the Eurostar from London St Pancras to Brussels. Obviously the train would have to travel through France before before arriving in Brussels in Belgium. 

After travelling through the tunnel, when I arrived in France, my phone automatically connected to the correct network and I was able to use 5G (and I guess make phone calls, but I didn’t make any calls). As I  crossed the border into Belgium I was switched automatically to a different network in Belgium.

I had no problems with data, texts and calls in Belgium and on my return visit there was another short stint with a French provider before entering the tunnel and rejoining Three when I was back in the UK.

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Roaming in France

Following issues with using data in Portugal a few years ago with excessive data usage on my iPhone, I did wonder if I should follow the  same process I had used in October 2023 when I went to Amsterdam, last year when I went to Europe, and when I went to Helsinki in February.

The process I would use is go into Settings -> Mobile Data and turn off virtually all the apps which could use mobile data.  I would turn off mobile data for virtually all my apps and also specifically iCloud Drive and iCloud Backup. I am pretty sure they were the culprits for my excessive data usage whilst in Portugal.

However this time I was heading to Calais and Dunkerque just for the day, though I was expecting to use my phone, I didn’t think I would go overboard on the data (even using iCloud for my photos) and I didn’t think I would exceed the 12Gb Fair Use limit.

When I arrived in France, my phone automatically connected to the correct network and I was able to use 5G (and I guess make phone calls, but I didn’t make any calls).

I did turn off data when I was on the ferry though (as recommended by DFDS) and connected to the Ferry WiFi.

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Roaming across Europe

This summer I travelled to Germany, taking the ferry to France, travelling to just outside Paris for a few days before then setting off through Belgium and Luxembourg to Germany.

Following issues with using data in Portugal last summer with excessive data usage on my iPhone, I followed the same process I had used last October when I went to Amsterdam.

So before we boarded the ferry at Newhaven, I went into Settings -> Mobile Data and turned off virtually all the apps which could use mobile data. Took me a while as there were a fair few. I turned off mobile data for virtually all my apps and also specifically iCloud Drive and iCloud Backup. I am pretty sure they were the culprits for my excessive data usage whilst in Portugal.

As and when I needed to use apps, I either used the campsite wifi, or switched on mobile data for specific apps.

Arriving in France I was able to roam without any issues, of course as I travelled across Europe I switched networks, first in Belgium, then in Luxembourg and finally in Germany. In the end I used four different country networks. Each time I switched over without issue as I crossed the border.

In Portugal I reached 80% of my 12GB limit within the first twenty four hours. I did wonder if I would reach the fair usage limit on this holiday. As it happens I did six days into the trip, with two days left. It was relatively easy to purchase a 1-day Data Passport for £6 for the two remaining days of our holiday rather than pay silly prices for data on a pay as you go basis.

Though difficult to tell, I think the main data culprits were Waze and Amazon Music, which were used extensively as we drove across the continent.

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Flaky Waze

Having arrived in Dieppe on a travelling holiday I started Waze and was a little annoyed that it was quite laggy. My position on the map didn’t reflect the reality of where I was.

It was challenging enough to drive in France anyhow, but without a working navigation tool, it was a little more difficult.

However the next time I started Waze it worked fine.

It is illegal to use a speed camera detection system in France, but this was easy to turn off in Waze.

Routing avoiding toll roads was also relatively easy.  It was a much nicer and more interesting journey. Yes it takes longer, but I found the driving experience so much better and more interesting than when we came back through Belgium on their motorways (no tolls).

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Wazing in and out to Paris…

I spent the last week of July in France and used Waze extensively to ensure we were going in the right direction and to the right place. Generally it worked fine, but I did have a few issues.

I do like Waze and I find that it is quite accurate in terms of arrival times, usually provides effective routing and I like the live traffic updates. I remember once it took me on what felt like a weird route out of Reading, but it took just ten minutes, whereas if I had taken the route I would have taken without Waze (as I didn’t know Reading very well) it would have taken at least thirty minutes. Waze took me down quieter less busy road, so I was out of Reading very quickly.

So I had used it already to get us down to the Eurotunnel Terminal and then after travelling on Le Shuttle to get us down to the campsite at La Croix Du Vieux Pont.

One quirk was that after taking us down lots of main roads, Waze then directed us down some very narrow country roads and lanes on the way to the campsite. I am not sure if this was faster, but was probably more direct. I did find driving down those roads a little nerve wracking, especially at the end of a rather long drive. However all was well in the end and we got to the campsite safely and in a reasonable timeframe.

I also used Waze to get us to Pierrefronds and back again, this time no issues.

So it was without any concern that I decided to use Waze to get a route to the outskirts of Paris. When we booked our holiday we thought it would be nice to visit Paris for the day. When I looked into this possibility at home, the obvious thing appeared to be, was to do the coach trip that the campsite put on, or catch the train. I didn’t really want to drive to Paris, as mainly we didn’t have the right pollution sticker (not enough time) and the thought of driving in Paris filled me with dread. However once at the campsite we found that due to Covid-19 that there wasn’t a coach trip running. As for the train, I did some internet searching and it looked like you needed to book tickets in advance. I then checked with the tourist information office on the campsite, they actually said not to catch the train, as Covid-19 was causing problems with the timetables. The office suggested we drive to the outskirts of Paris, park and catch the Metro into the centre of Paris.

This sounded like a practical plan. I programmed the car park, Q-Park Saint-Denis Université, into Waze the night before and all was fine.

The next morning we set off. Waze it was though was having none of it, and failed to set a route. I thought nothing of this, as I had been having a few 4G connectivity issues at the campsite and I thought once we got going and into an area with better connectivity, Waze would get sorted. On a visit to a nearby supermarket I had seen a road sign for Paris so we set off.

However despite getting better 4G reception, Waze was still failing to set a route. I think that the routing server was offline. So in the end as we approached Paris, we stopped and I changed to Google Maps to get us to that last leg to Saint-Denis Université. This worked fine, and I am glad I had directions, as I don’t think relying on road signs or even a map would have worked.

Having parked, we caught the Metro to the centre of Paris and made our way to Tour Eiffel.

This journey also demonstrated how much I have come to depend on Waze for getting to places (and back).

Interestingly, coming back from Paris, Waze was working fine!

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Weak French Connection

Having recently gone on holiday I wasn’t that surprised to find, as I did the previous year, poor 4G speeds whilst on the campsite in France.

Over the last few months we thought we wouldn’t be going on holiday at all because of Covid-19 and the lockdown. We had thought about going away in the UK, we looked at York but it was proving expensive and things we wanted to do weren’t open. At the end of July we checked a few sites and found that we could book a Eurocamp holiday relatively cheaply, especially compared to the UK holidays we had been looking at. We did wonder about the impact of Covid-19, but the story in France appeared to be less risky than in the UK! So we booked the holiday and five days we were driving down to Folkestone to catch the Eurotunnel.

As we entered France, thank you EU roaming legislation as my Three account easily connected to a French network. I recovered the obligatory SMS from Three which stated that I could use my allowances in France as though I was in the UK. I have an unlmited calls, text and data plan, however I was limited to a 20GB limit on data. We were only in France for six days so I thought that should be okay.

We were staying at the La Croix Du Vieux Pont campsite and though the phone said I had a good 4G signal, alas the speeds were nothing to text home about.

In the morning the connection wasn’t too bad, but by early evening the connection was not just poor, but intermittent as well. I did an (unscientific) speed test and you can see I was struggling to get more than 3Mbps download speeds on 4G.

I am guessing partly that the issue was, we were in a somewhat rural location. When we visited Paris, though I didn’t use my phone much, I think the connection was much better (which was to be expected).

The campsite, in theory, had wifi, but this wasn’t very good either by our caravan. In the first half of the week we could connect to the wifi for free, but this was “fixed” by the second half, where we would have to pay. So we became dependent on the 4G connection.

This was critical towards the end of the holiday as we had to fill in an online UK government form before we got back to the UK. We did manage this, but using the connection for anything apart from e-mail or basic web browsing was out of the question.

It was interesting to see that we could get 4G in the Eurotunnel, I had assumed that this wouldn’t be possible, but it worked, partly because we had already switched and connected to the French mobile phone network, so we remained on that as we went through the tunnel.