OH, my goodness. I was doing some fiddling about, calculating the cost of Petrol in the UK ! Glory be, it it really about $8.25 per US Gallon there? It appears to be around 1.30p. My goodness.
Will a Yankee woman be permitted to drive there without special training? If I get in trouble in traffic there, will it help if I cover my face and sit still? Will they beat me if I do not move?
Perhaps I should get a cycle and rain slicks right away? Is it too impossible to get a woman's frame with very high pressure tyres?
The change in culture seems to be much greater than going to Ohio.
G
Comments
Coming to visit us the Gwen?
Yes Petrol is about 1.30GBP per Imperial Gallon, not the tiny US one but yes it is expensive. Most of this is TAX and VAT.(approx 70%).
We drive on the right side of the road, being the LEFT. You can come and drive on your US License without issue. No training needed but starting off in our traffic in a jet-lagged state is not that advisable IMHO.
Bikes are widely available in a variety of sizes and specs. One chain with a lot of branches nationwide is Evans Cycles.http://www.evanscycles.com. The company Halfords also sells a lot of bikes but they aren't speciality dealers.
Our roads are much, much narrower than those in the US. We also have a lot of traffic so starting out on two wheels on your own would not be recommended.
I hope you come over to this side of the Pond. We are a small island but there is a lot worth seeing outside the cities.
I'm heading your way tomorrow, flying to Denver for three weeks R&R in the Rockies. The recen snowfall in CO and WY should be fun.
Samantha
Petrol
£1.30 a gallon? Rather a lot more than that! That is the price per LITRE.
Sorry
Too early in the morning. Caffeine hadn't kicked in.
Yes it should be £1.30 a Litre.
£1.30/ltr == £5.75/Gal == £4.59/US Gal == $7.59/US Gal
Diesel is more expensive than that.
Living in Britain
Yes, petrol is expensive all over Europe. Americans are often shocked by how expensive some things are. Sweets (candy) are cheap, I'm told, and clothes are not as expensive as Germany. Cigarettes are taxed so high that people used to travel to Europe to buy them. I think other European countries have increased their taxes since.
You can legally drive with a US driving licence for a couple of years, I think. But it's worth reading up on the different road laws. If you try turning right through a red light here you will be in a heap of trouble! Oh, and roundabouts? In Hemel Hempstead they have a roundabout known locally as 'the Magic Roundabout' which consists of 6 mini-roundabouts in a circle. Imagine the first time you see something like that while driving on the opposite side of the road from normal. One of my colleagues said he just shut his eyes and went for it the first time he saw it.
Police here rarely carry guns and have had so much diversity training that you might imagine they would be disappointed if you weren't a black one-legged t-girl. That said, they are still mostly white males in a position of authority.
Best not to try and play them, though. Like cops the world over they've heard every excuse thousands of times.
Cycling in the UK can be very dangerous, the roads are often narrow and crowded. There are few cycle lanes. A lot of car and commercial vehicle drivers just don't look for bikes. You would probably be safer in a car.
The cultural differences between London and Brighton can be nearly as big as the differences between States in the US. Someone told me: "in the US, a hundred years is a long time, in Europe, a hundred miles is a long way".
Regardless, people everywhere are individuals, you can never tell what will happen until you meet them.
Hope that helps.
Britain
You may add that there is decent public transportation available in most parts of the country. Railway connections are pretty good (but tickets can be quite expensive). There is even a decent bus service to many rural areas. (The locals will probably disagree and complain about the bad service, but in my opinion, compared to many other places in the world, British public transport is pretty good.)
--- Martin
Greetings If you want to get
Greetings
If you want to get around in Great Britain - England, Wales and Scotland - there is public transport to most towns and cities. However, getting to smaller places can be difficult, many villages do not have any transport service.
Just read a story about Google Maps in UK now including access to the timetables for buses, trains, ferries, trams and subways.
http://www.cnet.com/uk/news/google-maps-adds-17k-routes-to-u...
As for the cost of petrol it is around $5 for the equivalent of a USA gallon.
Brian
UK travel
Cheapest way to go any distance in the UK if you haven't a car is by coach (like the Greyhound). The underground however is the way to move around London unless you are with someone who knows the bus routes
Rhona
Rhona McCloud
I have to disagree about the underground ...
The underground is the way to travel around London if you're in a hurry, and are content staring at tunnel walls.
If you have time to spare, and want to actually see the city you're traveling through, I recommend to take the bus. You can hardly get a better view of London than from the top deck of a double decker bus, and even the single deckers aren't that bad. You don't even need to "know" the bus routes, there are usable bus maps (http://www.tfl.gov.uk/maps/bus).
--- Martin
US-UK experiences
When we were in Boston and NY earlier this year I calculated that petrol (gasoline) was about one tenth the cost in the UK (At that time $1.64 = £1). Having said that our cars tend to be more efficient (mpg) so your fuel will go a little further. Diesel will go even further but can be 6p/litre more expensive than petrol.
As for cycles, you should have no problem. Most are made with varying lengths of top tube to suit women's proportions and the other items such as bars and saddle are easily replaced. As some others have commented, riding in traffic is something that takes experience to build up to but riding on trails and cycle paths in the country is relatively safe and achievable.
Another thing I might add about our trip is this: Don't discount jet lag. Going westwards it took us no time at all to adjust to the extra five hours, barely even a day. Coming eastwards, it took both of us almost a week to get back to normal.
Penny
Jet Lag
As someone who travels a lot on Business (120K miles last year), I have found the best way to fly from the Eastern US to the UK to minimize jet lag is to take the DAY flights from JFK.
Leave at around 08:00EST and arrive in London around 19:00 local time. No Red-eye.
From the West Coast, there really isn't any choice but to take an overnight flight.
Take a direct flight it you can. If you have to fly via one of the US Carriers (UGH!, flying coach == avoid at all costs) then watch out for the routing. 2 or even three hops can be commonplace.
One route from LHR to Omaha took me via JFK, ATL and DFW. Four flights just to save $50. In the end I flew to Denver and a single hop to my destination.
Jet lag
Going to and from the US I had the same experience as you, Penny - easy going to the US, difficult coming home. However when we flew back from Nepal (ie the opposite direction) it was fine going and hard on our return. It didn't help that we had to reassemble our bikes and ride to Slough from Heathrow to catch a train north and then ride home :) Just as hard both ways when we visited New Zealand - fortunately our bikes and us were transported home by car :) I think going to a new place tends to balance out the jet lag because of the natural excitement.
Cycling in the UK is fine outside of London and the big cities. Bear in mind that London is as different from the rest of England (and the UK) as it is from the US - it really is a foreign city. I cycle commuted a total of at least 30 miles/day summer and winter for years (more on nice days when I came home the long way) and rode around 8 to 10 thousand miles/year in total. Sure the roads are narrow but there's a wealth of quiet lanes to ride - just get the necessary Ordnance Survey 1:50,000 (approx 1.25" to the mile) map and relish the truly stunning works of art and technology they are. The very best maps I've ever come across anywhere in the world.
Don't restrict yourself to the tourist hot spots. Go anywhere (almost) in the country and you'll find attractive countryside and interesting things to see. The fens in the east are pretty boring (more like outdoor factories) but a stones throw away in East Anglia (Norfolk and Suffolk) is real beauty and then there's most of Wales and Scotland as well as SW and Northern England. I live near the Peak District and my area is at the heart of the industrial revolution and a 'traitor' took the technology to the USA and started the cotton industry there.
Petrol is expensive but distances are less than in the US so it balances out to some extent.
So, having played the part of the UK tourist board, I'll just wish you a happy stay :)
Robi