Driving from Hamburg to England

Hi,

My partner and I are planning on driving back to England for a weeks holiday. We currently reside in Hamburg. We have a rough plan of what route we would like to take but would appreciate any advice and experiences of those that have made this trip.

We hope to drive to holland, spend a night in Amsterdam, get the ferry from Rotterdam to Hull. Drive home to Merseyside for a few days, then down south to either get the ferry from dover to calais or else use the channel tunnel, drive back through France, spending a night or 2, then drive back to sunny Hamburg.

So, any ideas? Are there any particular places worthwhile visiting? Any campsites, hostels, sights etc that can be recommended.

Thanks
Leila

Surely if your heading to merseyside you will need to by flying back as the local Vermin will be twoccing your car??

In the dim & distant past I have used the Hull <=> Europort ferries a number of times.

I used to drive down the A1 to Wildeshausen then go cross-country crossing the border at Nordhorn then on the Dutch Autobahn to Europort...
One arrival you dive only a few miles on normal roads then it dual carriage way and motorway across the Pennines... My destination was near Knutsford & could get there before collapsing from exhaustion having slept badly on the ferry...

Scousers do not nick other scousers cars.. only mancunians and londoners

Hull to Rotterdam ferries are ace, i always used to use them.

You get to travel overnight on a bloody big boat with casinos, bars etc onboard and then have breakfast in the morning before setting off, great way to travel.

Our car is not worth nicking!!!

We may not even make it out of Germany!

DFDS Newcastle - Ijmuiiden (Amsterdam) works fine.
Shorter crossings - Harwich - Hook of Holland is a long trek
(no longer do they have the 4.5 hour Catamarans).
Otherwise with the motorway along the French/ Belgian coast
(Via Antwerp) it is not too far to Calais and umpteen ferries per day.
The French ships are a bit more civilised (it is a duopoly) - and if it is windy
they are dead slow (difficulties getting in and out of the harbours) so do not count
on 90 minutes between Calais and Dover.
Last time we were back this way had astounding fog (and it was not winter)
driving to Dover harbour.
It's a bit of a trek from Calais to HH and I think the hotels in D
are a good bit cheaper than in Holland.

Also - Things/Places to see
Bruges is a pearl.
Lelystadt where the "Batavia" replica is berthed (if you are into old ships)
interested me.
The drive back via Cloppenburg is a bit more relaxed.
Bremen/Bremerhaven has great maritime Museums.
Antwerp is probably interesting if you are into diamonds etc.

I've done it several times and I'd advide you to get a TomTom.

It took me 11 hours door to door (Brighton) without one and 9 with.

If you pre-book the channel tunnel online then you get a 2 hour leeway either side, at no extra charge, which means that you can book a cheaper time and travel at a more expensive one. I advise leaving early to get south of Bremen before the roads get busy, after Bremen it's plain sailing all the way.

Good luck!

Have only just seen this thread.

You seem to have figured out pretty much which way to go, you are just looking for nice places, right?

Only thing I can add to this: We drove down to Dunkerque in April to take the Norfolk Line Ferry.
The drive down to Dunkerque was bloody long, much longer than we had expected (we only started at 10:30 a.m.). We thought we had booked a NICE hotel, but it turned out to be quite a tip. In case you should stay in Dunkerque, you might want to go to one of the hotels near the ferry port, there's a big choice, suppose every single one of them is much better than the one we stayed at.
However, our hotel was in city centre, there's also a little marina, it seemed quite nice when we arrived, but turned out to be completely dead when we went out for dinner (and it was a FRIDAY night!). Didn't see any nice restaurants, so went for food to a pub that turned out also to be the local booky. Interesting clientele...
The food was unexpectedly good, prices OK.
However, Dunkerque didn't do much for us - maybe we were at the wrong end and there's nicer areas?
We decided not to take the ferry back from Dunkerque again and rather drove to Hull (which was a much shorter drive coming all the way from Scotland with a short visit at friends' in Preston) and the P&O ferry from Rotterdam really is ace. In comparison to the other ferries we've used over the last 3 years it's the best. We invested a little more and booked a really nice cabin, which was absolutely worth it (it also came with a free mini bar - which was empty by the time we left in the morning...).

If you take your time driving back from France I can imagine there's nice places, but going on the ferry and then all the way down to Hamburg in one go - that's bound to take very long, cos sooner or later you will hit rush hour SOMEwhere...
Don't know how Lazybum got there so fast, we didn't (no, we are not afraid to drive more than 140km/h).
edit: we did get past Bremen before it got busy (had discussed the matter with Lazybum and others before) - but it didn't help.

I kept up a steady 200km virtually all the way

with no tickets

Well, I would have loved to do that, but there's always those d*ckheads who overtake a trucks at the speed of 90kmh not actually going any faster than the trucks and giving a sh*t if there's cars coming at higher speed.
argghhhhhhhh!

I did Harwich to Hook van Holland a few weeks ago. It is the best route, as the Cuxhaven route closed a few years ago.

6 hours ferry crossing and 6 hours drive, maybe less if you have a strong bladder

There is one that goes to Denmark but don't be fooled - it's an 18 hour crossing!

Cheers

Hi

Drove home last week for a quick visit to the parents and must recommend the Norfolkline from Dunkerque to Dover. Have tried most the routes back home in a car before.

Always used to go from Cuxhaven but that has long gone. The Calais routes i always find to crowded with people going on Stag weekends or booze holidays and after the drive from Hamburg thats the last thing you need. And the Esjberg - Harwich route is almost a cruise with the length of the crossing.

I went from Kiel (hour North of Hamburg) to Nottingham, door-to-door in 13-14 hours so can't complain. The drive to Dunkerque takes about 8 hours at a comfortable pace with stops from Kiel and the 2 hour crossing is a nice break before driving on when you reach the UK. Plus i found the ferry itself a lot nicer than any other i've been on.

May not be much benefit to everyone (and could be true for all ferry operators) but I arrived both in Dunkerque and Dover very early and was put on an earlier ferry for free without even having to ask. And i was able to book with 5 people on the ticket but in the end only i went and i didn't have to change the ticket or pay amendment fees - so it is useful if you are unsure on who will travel (I was told as long as i din't have someone who wasn't on the original ticket it was ok).

Oh and last things a Sat Nav is always great on the long journey as you do go through a couple of complicated sections and it also helps you find cheaper petrol off of the motorways