UKC

What's the story for hiring a car in Greece post Brexit?

Do you need an International Permit now?  Gov.uk says not but find it hard to believe anything they say....

We've emailed some hire companies but they just send a link back to Gov.uk. Recent experience anyone?

Thanks very much.

Hired a banger on Kalymnos and a nice Kia Stonic in Athens, both in the past couple of months, all they wanted was my UK driver's licence,

Chris

Was told at Sixt Athens that they didn’t require it, but police will ask for it if you get pulled over. This was March this year.

Well they would be wrong to wouldn't they?

https://www.gov.uk/driving-abroad/international-driving-permit 

Great, thanks 😊.

Aha just realised I was using my US driving licence - sorry for the misinformation 

We drove to Greece, so no problems hiring a vehicle. The only problem we encountered was navigation. Any - all maps we managed to get our hands on, including google, were in Greek characters. Place names do not resemble - in anyway at all - their latin alphabet equivalent.

Eh? The Road Editions maps (generally the best) and Michelin have for sure the names in both Greek and Roman script, there will be others.

Open Street based digital maps are in both as well, Locus for example.

Spelling can vary somewhat as there is no real official translation of the phonetics but that's not really a problem.

This was in 2018. I think we just assumed that our Tomtom sat nav would give us coverage in Greece. It didn't. All paper maps that we found, even in larger towns were in Greek script only. Google was a bit hit and miss (as I remember), it was, of course, just as crap as it is here in France in distinguishing the difference between a muddy track across a field and a metalled road. We did manage of course, but were wrong to assume stuff. Lack of preparation........ 

My Tom Tom worked perfectly in Greece in 2019, maybe you hadn't updated the map?

No worries!

I think I annoyed the someone by posting the correct information. Damn.

On a trip last month we had a big National Geographic road map with both latin and greek script on it. The only issue might have been that, once off the beaten track, road signs were only in greek script, but fortunately I can read Greek - a good classical education has its uses!

Ah, I knew I must be missing something...

Yeah I can read Greek letters too. It’s just that I don’t know what they mean.

Can you understand Boris then too???
Or does Classical Greek and snobbish Eton Latin not get taught together?

They don't 'mean' anything, it's not some picture language like Ancient Egyptian or Chinese. The letters are phonetics like most modern languages which means some are a bit difficult to convert to languages with other pronunciations. I lived for years in Πόρτο Χέλι which has various translations, the X being a particular difficulty as it's pronounced as an H by a heavy smoker who forgot his false teeth and is clearing his throat at the same time. In Roman script it will be Porto Cheli or Porto Heli and has to do with eel fishing. The next city has at least 7 ways to write it's name. Greek road signs can be interesting, they write Bends (in English) as Bents as there is no D sound in Greek.

Ancient (classic) Greek is different to modern Greek thank goodness, at least the numbers work!

Greek road signs can be interesting, they write Bends (in English) as Bents as there is no D sound in Greek.

Yes there is.  It's "nt" as your example suggests.

It was a joke Jim.