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Travel Tips - Things you might not have thought of!

86K views 120 replies 55 participants last post by  808dakine 
#1 ·
I thought it would be helpful to post some things that would make the trip easier. Some things relate to OSD specifically, others just general travel to Europe.
Please add on.
[Can we make this a sticky note?]
 
#38 ·
Not sure if I mentioned this but IF you like a wash cloth, best to bring one with you. Seems many hotels don't have them nor apartments.
 
#40 ·
Hope someone can help with this one... In the latest Volvo OSD promo video, there is a very brief shot of two people on a contraption pedaling down a (hopefully) abandoned rail line, very scenic shot. Does anyone know where that might be in Scandinavia? Appreciate any pointers anyone can make.
 
#41 ·
I haven't seen the promo video myself, but I suspect it is a draisine (swedish: dressin) that you are refering to.

http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dressin

There are quite a few abandoned railways around Sweden. On some of these there a organisations offering the possibility to rent a draisine for the day. Here are a few examples from the south of Sweden.

http://www.dressin.se/
http://www.dressincykling.se/
http://www.veteranjarnvagen.se/

Try googling on "dressin" and you will probably find a few more in other parts of Sweden.
 
#42 ·
Hotel Rates

One tip on hotel pricing that I picked up from a Rick Steves blog post: if you find a rate on one of the online hotel booking sites (i.e. Expedia, Orbitz, Venere, etc) that is lower than booking directly with the hotel, contact the hotel directly to ask if they will match it. The online booking sites charge the hotel a commission, and it is often cheaper for the hotel to skip the "middle man" and pass the savings on to you. http://www.ricksteves.com/plan/tips/makingres.htm (scroll down to "Booking Online")

This strategy worked well when I booked a hotel in Stockholm this week. I was able to get a superior King room at at my preferred hotel for the price of a standard. I simply emailed the hotel and asked, very politely, if they would honor the online booking agent's rate.

Trip Advisor is my preferred starting point in determining which hotels (or b & b's) you might want to stay at, and that site will automatically pull the pricing from each booking site. I will also Google for "unique lodging" or something like that to find places that maybe Trip Advisor doesn't know about yet. I found a truly awesome place on the Oregon Coast that way.
 
#43 ·
One tip on hotel pricing that I picked up from a Rick Steves blog post: if you find a rate on one of the online hotel booking sites (i.e. Expedia, Orbitz, Venere, etc) that is lower than booking directly with the hotel, contact the hotel directly to ask if they will match it. The online booking sites charge the hotel a commission, and it is often cheaper for the hotel to skip the "middle man" and pass the savings on to you. http://www.ricksteves.com/plan/tips/makingres.htm (scroll down to "Booking Online")

This strategy worked well when I booked a hotel in Stockholm this week. I was able to get a superior King room at at my preferred hotel for the price of a standard. I simply emailed the hotel and asked, very politely, if they would honor the online booking agent's rate.

Trip Advisor is my preferred starting point in determining which hotels (or b & b's) you might want to stay at, and that site will automatically pull the pricing from each booking site. I will also Google for "unique lodging" or something like that to find places that maybe Trip Advisor doesn't know about yet. I found a truly awesome place on the Oregon Coast that way.
Ah, that sounds like a great strategy, and good to work things out directly with the hotel! When I made our hotel bookings I tended to manically cross-reference tripadvisor reviews with those on booking.com, which also seems to have a larger selection of places in its inventory than tripadvisor has for reviews. That led us to a couple of nice finds in Germany that were VERY well reviewed on booking.com (just not in English - so I'd simply plop the text into google translate), that were also very affordable, turns out. Also handy to pull up the location on maps.google.com and just do a keyword search for hotel, and even more leads will pop up.

SO Splitshot, I see you're in Tacoma! I'm a native of the PNW (Seattle, also lived in Corvallis), and return back regularly. Would you kindly PM me your find on the Oregon Coast?!?! (assuming it's too off-topic for the forum....) :)
 
#44 ·
Do you like old cars and history? A favorite destination for many Volvo Overseas Delivery customers is the Volvo Museum in Goteborg where an extensive collection of Volvo cars from the 1920's to the current decade can be seen.

Would you like an unusual travel experience? How about going for a scenic ride in a vintage Volvo when you are on vacation in Sweden?

Visitors to Goteborg can now drive a classic Volvo car as part of a 1 1/2 hour guided historic tour of the city! More information about this unique way to explore the home town of Volvo can be found at the Time Travel Sightseeing Goteborg website: http://www.timetravelgbg.se/index-en.html
 
#45 ·
Hi All,

We will be traveling through Germany. I have read that you need Eco Stickers to travel through certain cities. Have any of you done this? What is the best way to acquire one of these stickers? One website I read said that in order to get one ahead of time, through the mail, we need our registration information. But we don't know that. Do you know if we get our registration information for our car ahead of time, so we may be able to order one of these stickers online?

If I am posting in a total wrong thread, my apologies. I just thought if someone has good tips for traveling in Germany, and responds to this, then this might be the best thread. Thank you for your help!
 
#46 ·
Hi All,

We will be traveling through Germany. I have read that you need Eco Stickers to travel through certain cities. Have any of you done this? What is the best way to acquire one of these stickers? One website I read said that in order to get one ahead of time, through the mail, we need our registration information. But we don't know that. Do you know if we get our registration information for our car ahead of time, so we may be able to order one of these stickers online?

If I am posting in a total wrong thread, my apologies. I just thought if someone has good tips for traveling in Germany, and responds to this, then this might be the best thread. Thank you for your help!
Hmmm. I'll have to google that one. Please let me know what you find or websites to go to. We are thinking about Germany to Switzerland trip.
thx
 
#47 ·
The advice I saw was to stop at a gas station near the town and pick it up there.

Don't know how near you need to be. Google eco (or congestion) sticker and the town and for sale.

Share the results please. For our OSD trip, Germany was just a "drive through" rather than a visit (we've been there a few times before) so we did not research the stickers except to verify we wouldn't be in any of the cities.
 
#48 ·
Hi, all. Great tips.

Have any of you left your car at the FDC, then returned to pick it up to drive it for the latter portion of your trip? We are considering taking the train to Oslo, then to Bergen and back to Gothenburg, since it will be easier to actually see the scenery when I don't have to pay attention to the road. (I've driven in Iceland, so I know the hazards that come with the terrain: twists, turns, sheer drops with no guardrails, wind, fog and sheep in the middle of the highway.)

We will then return to Gothenburg, drive from there to Copenhagen, Malmo and Lund, so I won't be quite ready to ship the car back on delivery day. Of course, I could ask the FDC directly if they would let me do that, but thought I'd check here first. I am also considering driving 1 way to Bergen, then taking the ferry to Hirtshals. I don't mind long drives, but I do want to take the most sensible route.

Thank you in advance!
 
#51 ·
Hi, all. Great tips.

Have any of you left your car at the FDC, then returned to pick it up to drive it for the latter portion of your trip? We are considering taking the train to Oslo, then to Bergen and back to Gothenburg, since it will be easier to actually see the scenery when I don't have to pay attention to the road. (I've driven in Iceland, so I know the hazards that come with the terrain: twists, turns, sheer drops with no guardrails, wind, fog and sheep in the middle of the highway.)

We will then return to Gothenburg, drive from there to Copenhagen, Malmo and Lund, so I won't be quite ready to ship the car back on delivery day. Of course, I could ask the FDC directly if they would let me do that, but thought I'd check here first. I am also considering driving 1 way to Bergen, then taking the ferry to Hirtshals. I don't mind long drives, but I do want to take the most sensible route.

Thank you in advance!
Are you planning on getting on the train right after picking up the car? Why not adjust the outbound travel date (or delivery date) so you pick up the car when you're planning on driving it? There's no rule that says you have to pick up the car the day you arrive in Europe or Gothenburg; you could pick it up after returning from Oslo.

We arrived 2 days before delivery (wife loves to travel but gets really messed up with the timezone and meal time changes so we plan on having down days at the start of a big trip). During our trip we ran into people who spent days in Copenhagen before taking the train over to Gothenburg to pick up their car.

Remember, this isn't like a free trip from a timeshare place where you have to sit through a hard-sell session... :)
 
#55 ·
I wonder if FDC would allow you to take the tour before you pick up your car. I would expect that they'd be willing.

I was able to take the tour weeks after pick up because the factory was closed for a service day on my schedule date. We picked up the car as planned, drove around Europe, came back to Gothenburg a day early, and took the tour.
 
#57 ·
Fyi- the Garmin our friends lent us was a huge help over there. It also alerted for all the Traffic Cams across the country, which helped too.
 
#58 ·
Glad that worked well for you. We also had the camera database...
 
#62 · (Edited)
RFID secure wallets and purses, not only in EU but at any busy airport. Not only your magnetic card, but passport info
can be stolen by a guy sitting with an open laptop and a USB RF scanner. Within hours all your info will be online for sale.

Travelon is a great company IMHO, not only do they RFID but they use steel lines in purses and belt pouches, the wallet I use
every day, and they don't look bad at all, great ratings on Amazon.

Lastly put your whole family on Equifax with credit block, no one will open any line of credit as you will look to be "under
investigation" with all 3 major credit bureaus unless you place a temporaty unlock, it works great, Audi called me to report
they could not run a credit check, I unlocked online and they did the credit check during the call, then locked it back on.
 
#64 ·
From a SS member who works for MasterCard:

"Actually being in the cc industry this is a common myth. The card security prevents cloning the RFID to make another card."
 
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#66 ·
Traffic rules in Sweden

I haven't seen this specific topic in the forum so it might be useful to highlight some of the traffic rules in Sweden that might be different from American rules.

  • No free right turns at traffic lights. There are special traffic lights that will turn green if allowed in that particular intersection. If no green arrow (or green main light) = stop.
  • Yellow signal at traffic light mean stop - do not cross intersection (if possible in a safe way). Although this is rarely done in bigger cities of course.
  • Stop for traffic inside the roundabouts. When clear, drive into roundabout. Use right turn signal to exit roundabout. If there are arrows in the lanes (several lanes in a roundabout) follow those. Otherwise know that it is legal to drive in whichever lane you wish so look out for traffic while in the roundabout. But use common sense (and mirrors and turn around to check so no one is in the blind spot). In some other countries in Europe, traffic inside the roundabout have to yield to anyone going into the roundabout = traffic chaos as it defeats the whole purpose of the roundabout in my opinion.
  • Normal oncoming lane separator is short dashes - You are free to overtake if oncoming traffic allows. If long dashes - some sort of danger ahead, maybe fixed lane separation, blind crest, sharp corner, don't overtake here. Solid lines - you are not allowed to cross this line at all.
  • If multiple lanes in your direction of travel (mostly bigger cities or highways) - keep to the rightmost lane. You could be fined if police sees that you are in the left lane unnecessary and they have the energy to do something about it. Sometimes they are on a special lookout for that. Remember to use indicator when changing lanes.
  • When coming to a pedestrian crossing, you are required to stop to let any pedestrians pass.
  • Alcohol and driving do not mix in Sweden. https://polisen.se/en/Languages/Laws-and-Regulations/Traffic-violations/
  • If a bus is blinking out from a bus stop, you are required to let them out if it is a 50km/h speed limit or lower (in cities more or less).
 
#67 ·
I have a July 2016 OSD and we're planning on spending the bulk of time there visiting other parts of Europe. As we're planning the drives, ferries, and flights, it became pretty hard to keep track of all of the details. A "road trip planner" become a necessity and there are quite a few of them out there. The best one I came across is Furkot - it has a good interface and it's free.



The best tip I have that saved us quite a bit of time is that you aren't restricted to only flying SAS/BA. Delta was far more convenient for us out of MSP as it saved nearly 7 hours off the total trip time each way compared to SAS.
 
#68 · (Edited)
Traveling south

Thanks for all the useful tips. This is very exciting! We're planning our first OSD, taking delivery of our V60 on May 20, 2016 and heading south. That's just 3 months away and we're starting to plan only now, because we just wrapped up our deal yesterday. Thanks to elvedin on this forum, I'm looking at Furkot. The travel agent who booked our flights recommended viamichelin.com, so I'll likely take a look at that, too.

I would welcome suggestions on how we could get out of the factory and hit the road as early in the day as possible. We have an ambitious travel schedule and hope to make it to the Aosta Valley in Italy in 3 days. Has anyone on this forum driven south and could say whether it's realistic to make it to Heiligenhafen, Germany on the first day? It looks like about 500 km - and the Rødby to Puttgarden ferry seems to run about every 45 minutes. That's why I'm eager to get on the road as early in the day as possible. The Autobahn through Germany will hopefully be nice and fast and we can make it to at least Frankfurt on the second day. Then, let's see how long it'll take to make the rest of the way to Italy.

After Aosta, we're going to Turin where our son lives. On our way back, we'll head out from Turin, go to France, and drop our Volvo off in Frankfurt before a flight for the second leg of our vacation in Finland. I did a quick route on Google Maps, which is posted here - I'm glad we're not going to do the whole loop in the 30 hours Google suggests it'll take :) If anyone has been in these parts and has tips, thank you in advance!

 
#69 ·
You could ask for first delivery in the morning (which I believe would be 9:00 AM - pickup at the hotel at 8:30 AM).

Do the formalities (an hour) and out of fairness spend another hour going over the car, getting it setup, etc.

You could leave the FDC by say 11:00 AM - but why not stay until noon then and have a free lunch on Volvo?

Leaving the FDC it is a leisurely drive south to Malmo - figure roughly 3 hours / 300 km. Nice road - not much traffic.

From the bridge to Rodby ferry figure another 1.75 hours / 175 km.

Scandlines runs the ferry between Rodby and Puttgarden (Germany).

https://www.scandlines.com/tickets-und-tarife/tickets-and-prices/puttgarden-rodby.aspx

A ferry generally leaves every half-hour at 15 and 45 minutes after the hour ... so worse case you have to queue and wait a half hour. Transit time is 45 minutes. So call it 1.25 hours max to land in Germany.

That's a total of 6 hours from the FDC to Germany - and if you left the FDC at noon it would be dinner time by the time you got to Germany. Even consider grabbing a quick bite to eat on the ferry ...

Also note: 20 May 2016 is a Friday - you may run into extra traffic ...

On that date the sun sets in Hamburg around 9:20 PM - so you still have plenty of daylight left.

From the Puttgarden ferry to the outskirts of Hamburg is about 1.5 hours / 150 km.

I would expect here and possibly going through some other major cities in Germany you can expect traffic, etc.

For me I would probably not try to go beyond here in the first day.

Yes - while the autobahn can be nice and fast, also remember that in areas of higher population density there are speed limits. Traffic, congestion, accidents and construction can really affect your travel plans (add time).

If you were to stay just north of Hamburg on that first night you could head south on the A7 towards Hanover and towards Frankfurt. That would be around 500 km and maybe even under 5 hours. Given that is also Saturday morning you should be able to avoid the Hamburg weekday traffic and make good time heading south.

I'm not familiar with driving around Frankfurt and points south from there. But as you head south from your first night's stop - maybe consider not going to Frankfurt but continue east of the city on the A7 (and maybe avoid the Frankfurt traffic?) I've stayed in Wurzburg - nice area.

Personally I'd try to get as far south in Germany as you can - as the next segment to Aosta is going to take you through some pretty scenic places.

Remember to consider time for fuel stops, meals and getting the vignettes necessary for some countries:

http://www.tolls.eu/

Another good mapping tool is ViaMichelin:

http://www.viamichelin.com/

Whether using the Michelin or Google maps site I usually add some time to routes - sometimes as much as 20% - and my experience is you often can't realize the times these sites will quote you to get from point A to point B.

One last thought: Italian ZTL

Do some research on this one and since you son lives there ask him. Driving in the Zona Traffico Limitato can really incur hefty fines!!! :(

http://www.visitatorino.com/en/how_to_move_by_car.htm
 
#71 ·
This is a great thread! Has anyone encountered any challenges with purchasing fuel in Sweden, Norway, or Finland--specifically regarding finding filling stations and finding gasoline as opposed to diesel? Or regarding paying for fuel at the gas stations?

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#72 ·
Has anyone encountered any challenges with purchasing fuel in Sweden, Norway, or Finland--specifically regarding finding filling stations and finding gasoline as opposed to diesel? Or regarding paying for fuel at the gas stations?
Not at all. My experience is gas stations are pretty plentiful and you should find Euro 95 grade gas everywhere. (That is about equiv to the US 91 octane and what you need to use in the drive-e cars.)

With today's navigation systems you should also have access to a large POI database including where all stations are!

I've never had a problem with paying for fuel - whilst I've always used a credit card without problem ... I would recommend carrying some local currency for emergency cases where a credit card may not work.
 
#74 ·
I travel in Finland every couple of years and have had problems trying to use the fully automated (no attendant) gas stations with an American credit card without a chip. So, if you don't have a chip card yet, I'd recommend getting one. Cash is always a good idea, as rpmccormick recommended.
 
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