Car Type to Hire in England

The vast majority of us manage without a 4x4. This is usually bought as status symbol rarely seeing any off road work or perish the thought, mud!

Camping outside of campgrounds is illegal in England. Not that I care but the police might. You will be fine with a small car. Automatics, for the person above, are not seen as a luxury item they're just dull and don't let you drive how you'd like.

I live in England and I care. Now, the OP may be different but I've seen what gets left behind after 'freedom' campers.

plenty of cheap campsites. You don't need a 4 x 4.

Automatics, for the person above, are not seen as a luxury item they're just dull and don't let you drive how you'd like.

Now now filly ... be nice ... the"person above" has a name.

And while I shan't lower the tone of the thread by having a debate about automatic v manual, there is no excuse for car rental companies to almost double the price for the automatic version. It is ridiculous and cultural - it doesn't happen in the US, Canada, Australia, or New Zealand (in short, the civilised world).

And driving on dreadful, clogged UK roads, an automatic would have been preferred, instead of rowing the boat in these things with six forward gears ... who are they kidding???

Automatics, for the person above, are not seen as a luxury item they're just dull and don't let you drive how you'd like.

Now now filly ... be nice ... the"person above" has a name.

And while I shan't lower the tone of the thread by having a debate about automatic v manual, there is no excuse for car rental companies to almost double the price for the automatic version. It is ridiculous and cultural - it doesn't happen in the US, Canada, Australia, or New Zealand (in short, the civilised world).

And driving on dreadful, clogged UK roads, an automatic would have been preferred, instead of rowing the boat in these things with six forward gears ... who are they kidding???

A quick search for a Astra manual came in at £109 per week with the auto at £128 I don't consider that almost double. I agree that th UK has many clogged roads however with a little planning and a map most of this can be avoided. I regularly travel between Buckinghamshire and Wiltshire a distance of 120 miles and by using cross country routes and avoiding main commuter routes I find it a delightful stress free journey travelling through beautiful countryside and attractive villages, just what most tourists are looking for with no traffic jams

Well ... that's very good. The quotes I was getting early this year were vastly different between manual and automatic - we're not that tight with money for travel, but the big difference was more than enough to give us pause. And I didn't mind driving a manual, I just thought six forward gears was excessive, and didn't enhance the driving experience.

And in our meanderings around England, Scotland, Ireland, and NI, we also stayed off major highways almost all the time, and were well rewarded by doing so. We also listened to the BBC - the channel we had not only had good people on it, there were reports of traffic mayhem that might affect us, very frequently too - there seemed to be a lot of mayhem per day.

And a big jack-knifing semi-trailer (B-double, articulated lorry) lost a tyre spectacularly in front of us on a rare sojourn on the M1 near Peterborough, so we headed into the countryside, using the GPS to gamely find our way to Cambridge. It is was very funny, because we had a mini-convoy of about six cars following us faithfully ... if they had only known we were Aussies driving these roads for the very first time.

But we got there, via a lot of little villages with funny names, like Pidley and Earith.

GPS - what is wrong with a decent road atlas? You can plan your own route then and discover lots of hiden gems....

Had a UK licence since 1982 and have never had an automatic gearbox car or used a sat nav - only use a GPS in the hills whilst walking, not on the road.

A road atlas can usually be found at a reasonable price in most petrol stations and it gives you a bigger picture of the area than a small screen can ever dream of.

You must be great fun t dinner parties, wasleys.

If you don't know the value of a GPS, then you've never used one (or perhaps not used if effectively).

And scribbler, we did buy a nice big AA Atlas of Great Britain (a title we found rather grand, or perhaps quaint), however a GPS has a critical use when you are driving on roads you have never seen before, to places you haven't been before, with a great deal of unforgiving traffic in play, and a monster round-about coming up.

And the flippin' car has a tinny little motor and six manual gears ...

"If you don't know the value of a GPS, then you've never used one "
Try telling that to the e f f ing idiot articulated lorry driver following his sat nav to get from Maple Cross to Chalfont St Peter and got stuck in a single track lane. Screaming and shouting at me because he was just "following his sat nav", well that was his fault then. Then stalled his lorry on a hill and very nearly reverse the lorry back into my car so he could take a run at it. Of course I had to get out and arrange for the queue of several hundred yards behind me to back up so the e f f ing idiot could take a run up the hill.
When he finally got to his destination it was apparently me who being obnoxious.
Given the average truck driver appears to only have 2 brain cells the I suppose it was typical.