UKC

If anybody is in France at the moment, how hard is it to find petrol and generally get around? Hard to tell from the BBC reports. Supposed to be driving out to Ceuse tomorrow night and saturday. My van will do 650 miles on a tank, so I can fill up in Dover and get a long way south. But will I ever get home?!

Any on the ground reports much appreciated!

In reply to GDes:

I'm in the same situation, my wife is already out there in the Languedoc and our local garage is now out of diesel.

I'm going to set off and see how I do, I can almost get there on a tankful and hopefully will pick some up somewhere. If necessary I might drive down into Spain and fill up, it's only an hour or so.

Could you spend a couple of hours driving just over the border into Italy?

In reply to GDes:

Here in Briancon some garages have fuel and yesterday a friend was able to get back from a couple of days in Marseille on essence but no gasole was on sale in the same garage on the motorway. 20€ and 30€ limits have been imposed on purchases of fuel but panic buyers are driving around with full tanks.

In reply to GDes:

I went shopping this morning and filled up at the local supermarket.

I had to wait for one person in front of me to fill up and move on. Absolute chaos!
SW France - Near St Gaudens.

Quite strange, since several sources are reporting that our area is out of fuel - which the likes of the BBC pick up on.
Quite honestly, if I hadn't read about it on the BBC I would not have known about it.

It does vary across France though, with the NW being the hardest hit as far as I hear - Though I can't tell you how hard hit without just repeating some hearsay, like the BBC!

In reply to GDes:
More about the Briancon area. Automated, non manned Leclerc garages currently well stocked just north of and just south of Briancon, as you come over the Col du Lautaret. No problem apparently in Guiestre either.
Incidentally the Galibier is open and the temporary road below La Grave gives normal access from Grenoble too.
Ski touring is good. Rivers are filling up with kayaks. Rock is coated with sunshine. Afternoon temperature today is 25 C. On and off road cycling is busy. Giro starts from Guillestre tomorrow.
Some via ferattas are closed. Take care when planning simple circular walks as torrents are high.
French kids are in school next week.

In reply to Stairclimber:

That wins a star for a most very helpful post!

Thanks very much, think we'll go for it.

In reply to GDes:

Any updates over the next week would be really useful.
Thanks

In reply to CPH:

Hello. Just crossed the channel this morning. Drove back from Font. 2 out of 3 petrol stations were fine. Most had 40 Euro fill limits tho. It actually seemed worse earlier in the week before the limits went in (queues etc). Based on what I saw over the last week, I wouldn't be too worried.

In reply to GDes:

I flew back from Bordeaux last night to the UK, and had been in France for a couple of weeks. Most petrol stations in the areas we visited were fine...sometimes a small queue. As someone else said, if I hadn't seen it on the BBC I wouldn't have know anything was amiss.

In reply to 1234None:

Again, any more updates would be useful.
I'm planning to drive down the autoroutes to Provence late next week.
It depends how the situation develops re. fuel.

In reply to CPH:

Drove back from the Pyrenees at the weekend. No problems anywhere with fuel fill ups.
Only problem I had was when I got home, I'd been stung with a £72 fine from the Dartford crossing from our outward journey a month ago. I didn't know that the London congestion charges now apply to the crossing. So if you heading that way, be aware and check how to pay the toll before crossing.

Al (one fairly pissed off with London traveller)

In reply to CPH:

After the initial panic when filling stations were just emptied out it does seem to have returned to more or less normal - for the moment. However, the worst affected areas are the north coast and also the lower end of the Rhone valley in the immediate area of Marseille - Mrs J went to Marseille last Wednesday and there was no fuel at the autoroute stations. Then Friday we went to Lyon and back to Buis and there were no problems getting fuel on the autoroute and no queues either - we topped the tank up twice just to be sure, but clearly this was unnecessary. It seems that diesel is the first to go. Right now there's fuel in Buis in one of the two garages. So unless the strike action increases it looks OK for the moment.

In reply to GDes:

Drove down to Dover yesterday. Because everyone is filling up before boarding the filling stations are either running out or only allowing a limited amount of fuel, so you can't be guranteed on a last minute fill up over here either!

In reply to Seymore Butt:



It's not the Congestion Charge, the standard Dartford toll was changed from people in booths to a congestion charge style camera and online payment system last year.

In reply to ianstevens:

thanks everyone

In reply to CPH:

Drove back from Lyon airport, through Grenoble and down to the Vercors last night. All stations I passed seemed to be operating as normal. My parents are visiting and picked up a hire car at St Exupery, but were told they didn't need to bring it back full if there were problems. The Total at LYS seemed to be fine last night though.

we made it down to st leger with no problems at any of the motorway petrol stations, and no problems around here.

In reply to GDes:

thanks Ged.
any updates everyone?