Thinking about driving from Germany to London instead of flying. Anyone have any knowledge or experience on this? I assume there is the train tunnel and some ferries? How much are they, how much do they cost? What city on the mainland Europe do they come out at?
Interested in any anecdotes you guys might have to share.
Here is wikipedia about the Chunnel = Channel tunnel.
This is the Eurostar, the train from London, St. Pancreas to Belgium/France.
I didn’t take a car, but I looked very hard for non-flight options when travelling to England last August and October 2007, and both the ferries from the Netherlands and to France were expensive and ran seldom (I don’t remember if they ran more often before the chunnel, and business dried up, or whether there’s too much sea traffic in the channel to have more ships.)
If you start from the UK and take the train, and depending which country you want to go to, the english branch of the Deutsche Bahn offers special prices to Germany. They are hard to catch, though - you have to book days, better weeks, in advance. Wait I see they changed it again. Last summer it was special offer, like 65 Pounds or so. Hmmm. They still offer a special (=hard to get, quickly sold out) price on the german site, though: 49,- Euros for a single ticket Germany -London (Which means you have to buy a return ticket or be stranded. I don’t know if they let you buy from the german site if your residence is outside; if you run into problems, you can PM me, so you can order it on my adress and I mail it to you, if necessary.
If you take the Eurostar, they will x-ray your bags (in case somebody wants to explode the train), but I didn’t have to take my shoes off, at least.
Driving the route is very simple. You take the motorways (autobahn / autoroute) to Calais, then you go to England via the Channel Tunnel, then you go to London on the motorway. Flying is going to be significantly cheaper, though. And quicker. But you’ll have to hire a car this end.
This is A ferrysite. This isa different company.
About the Eurostar: I played around a bit with specials and starting options - it can make a difference whether you go France-UK and return (the dates in the other order, of course) or start from UK to France.
I don’t think there is any such thing as a ferry from Germany to Britain, though I could be wrong. I know you can get a ferry from the Hook of Holland to Harwich, on the south coast and drive to London from there. There are other ferries from Holland to Britain, but they go to places further north in England and Scotland.
There are a few ferry routes from different place in France to different places on the English south coast, but if your heart is set on using the tunnel in your car, you’ve got one choice - get on the train with your car at Calais in France and about forty minutes later you’ll be in Folkestone. You can check out the prices at www.eurotunnel.com. It’s not dear and there are something like ten trains a day. If you want to use the train as a person with no car, you can get get on it in Brussels or Paris and get off it in London, as has been said. But you can’t get on a Channel tunnel train with your car in any of those places.
Ah, it’s Operation Sea Lion?
There are plenty of ferries. The quickest and cheapest ones run the shortest distance (and are the most frequent). Calais to Dover takes around 90 minutes.
You’re right. There used to be a Harwich-Hamburg service, but now it’s Esbjerg or the Hook, and the fast ferry for the latter has been dropped, due to fuel costs. (Pssst…East Anglia ain’t on the south coast 
)
Ooops. Thanks for putting me straight on that.
I know we shouldn’t nitpick minor spelling mistakes, but come on, “St. Pancreas”? 
Hey, I’ve actually said that once, so I tend to give people a break. It’s an easy enough mistake to make!
Top Gear drove from (I think) Switzerland to England via the Chunnel - just google “Top Gear Economy Fuel Challenge” and I think you’ll find it on YouTube…
I’ve driven, ridden a motorcycle, from London to Italy. I bought my Chunnel tickets online and it was quite a bit cheaper. It was quite a fun experience and I would do it again. The hardest part for me was when I came out on the other side I was expecting to be able to exchange money as all I had were dollars and pounds. There’s nothing on the French side and I would suspect that it’s the same on the English side. I believe that the exit runs basically right into the highway, at least that’s how I remember it on the French side.
I’d like to take a ferry across the channel as well, but as of yet haven’t had the chance. If you want to drive I say go for it, make an adventure out of it and have fun.
We’ve done that trip many times. If it’s just one or two of us we’ll fly, but if it’s all four then we take the ferry (Stena Line) to the Netherlands, then drive from there. It’s a lot of time door-to-door, but they let you board the ferry a couple of hours early to get settled and get some sleep. The kids really enjoy it as if feels like a big adventure.
It’s where the “open and notorious loose livers” referred to in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer are sent to repent! 
That’s awesome. I am actually moving to Italy. I have a little vacation time before moving there, and I’d like to visit London and some other places.
My options right now are to either fly to London and ride trains and stuff stopping at various cities on the way back to Germany… pick up my car and drive the rest of the way to Ital.
Or, drive to london and back. I’d have more control this way. As long as it isn’t prohibitively expensive, I think I will go this route. I drove 1600 miles the other week going through France, Belgium, Luxembourg and Germany. Lots of fun!!
What’s the process of loading and unloading my car from the chunnel or the ferry? Is it pretty simple? Then just hop on the road and try to get used to driving on the other side?
Well for the motorcycles they put us in our own seperate section as we had to stand with them. I think they might have let us off first. I was only able to go from London to France, didn’t come back as the bike broke down.
As I remember I think we loaded from the side of the train. Everyone pulled in after going through the French customs. Then you milled around for a bit and they lined everyone up. Coming out on the other end it was right on to the highway, and on the proper side so no worrying about driving on the wrong side, or even crossing over. From what I remember there was nothing around, which was very strange. I wonder if it’s the same going from France to England. I would guess it is.
Getting off the train was different then getting on as they just opened the front of the train and everyone drove straight off, at least I think that’s how it happened. As for getting used to driving on the other side of the road, I’ve done it 4-5 times now, never had much of a problem. I could see it being strange though being on the wrong side of the car.
I’d go for it, if you have the time and money. I had a great time seeing things I wouldn’t have seen had I flown everywhere. Even just the roads and stuff were fun.
Sorry, I don’t get it - how do you spell it?
St. Pancras
St. Pancreas is right next-door to King’s Crotch.