 Poster: A snowHead
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Hi, an Aussie couple coming to spend a month in French Alps (Sallanches) and a month Dolomiti (Laion) to ski and then head to southern Italy. So three months away and we need a car but getting a lot of confusing answers re car hire / lease. So we know we need winter tyres (snow chains are painful). We are arriving / departing Paris. Any knowledgeable souls out there who know how we can get either a eurolease / hire car with winter tyres from /to Paris?
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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I'd guess that's a fantasy from a Paris depot and probably cheaper and easier to pay for a set of winters at a garage near the alps. Pick up your car in Geneva maybe? Or somdwhere like Annemasse?
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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I have no idea on the relative costs of hiring with or without chains from Paris, but for the length of time you need them for it's probably easier just to buy a cheap pair on your way south
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I would not be wanting to change the tyres on a rental ... insurance issues, etc.
I don't think you can "lease" a car for a month?
I'd take the train from Paris to Geneva and pick a car up there. At least then you'll have winter tyres. I'd probably spend on AWD.
I'd phone the rental companies - you might find a month's rental at better rates.
Where is Laion? Google doesn't recognise?
Why Sallanches? It's not exactly glamourous ...
P.S. rental rates seem to have suddenly dropped in price.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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I thought Aussies coming to Europe bought a car on arrival and sold it again when leaving. Has the world changed that much?
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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| johnE wrote: |
| I thought Aussies coming to Europe bought a car on arrival and sold it again when leaving. Has the world changed that much? |
If the OP is wanting a car for 2 months that might work out cheaper than renting......
Alternatively if they want to rent then as has been suggested rather than renting from Paris if they travel by train to an alpine location much more chance of finding rental vehicles equipped with winter tyres and chains.
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As others have said, buy a set of chains in a supermarket when you reach the Alps. They'll probably spend the whole vacation in the boot.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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@andmelffion, I think (!) your US site is confusing lease with rental and your Sixt site is 1 month and over ... just sayin'
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| under a new name wrote: |
| @andmelffion, I think (!) your US site is confusing lease with rental and your Sixt site is 1 month and over ... just sayin' |
As regards the Sixt site the OP was I think wanting a car rental for a total of 2 months, so not a problem if Sixt in France allow their long term rental car to be taken outside France into Italy?
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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@Vegemite skiier, suggest you use trains and pre booked taxis, much cheaper. You’ll struggle to rent a fully wintered car from Paris, too far north. If you want a car head down to Munich or Stuttgart on the fast trains and rent from an off airport pickup and you’d be sorted. Avoid airport pickups, they’re a rip off. Also factor in parking, not cheap in resort and most of the time it’ll be sat there doing nothing. If you need chains buy at supermarket and gift to others before you leave.
Last edited by snowHeads are a friendly bunch. on Sun 23-10-22 10:07; edited 1 time in total
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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@Alastair Pink, oops, my bad, I read one month total. Sorry @andmelffion!
Munich and Stuttgart not very handy for Sallanches!
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@under a new name, not that far when you’ve flown in from Oz, a cool drive across, might be tempted by the Austrian or Swiss options as drives west. In any event i’d not be pre-booking a winterised car for going into their Alps from a french airport.
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You know it makes sense.
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I used to spend extended periods in Spain and the best/cheapest way of hiring a car then was to return to Alicante airport every 28 days, return the current car and start a new rental. There was something whereby anything over a 4 week rental the price shot up dramatically. This was during winter months and this method offered quite incredible value.
If this was me, I'd look at hiring a car in Paris for a month and returning there. Then flying or train to Milan and hiring a car there for a month. Then work out what to do for the southern Italy portion of the trip a bit later. This means you should escape two pitfalls of airport car rental - cross border travel and the extended rental duration. As such, you should be able to get the flexibility that a car rental can provide for your trip but at decent rates that won't penalise you for doing something different to what the most airport car rental is aimed at.
I can't see that you'd need either chains or winter tyres in Sallanches unless it is now a legal requirement. On the odd day that is does snow that low down you can just stay in or catch a bus to St Gervais. If you are accessing different ski systems in the area then this can be done from fairly low-altitude car parks - Morillon or Samoens at around 700 metres and St Gervais or Megeve at around 1000 metres. Keep and eye on the weather forecast and I'd doubt you shouldn't find yourself getting caught out and/or stuck in the snow. I'd agree with another post that Sallanches isn't particularly glamorous, but I can see that it would make a great base for exploring local ski areas, provide good value for a month's stay, and give the feeling of living in a real French town.
Just my opinion, I'm sure others might disagree or have their own valid suggestions.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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| under a new name wrote: |
<CUT>
Where is Laion? Google doesn't recognise?
Why Sallanches? It's not exactly glamourous ...
P.S. rental rates seem to have suddenly dropped in price. |
Laion is just down the valley from Ortisei (try the alternative spelling of Lajen...)
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Poster: A snowHead
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@YellowAndBlue, on a snowy day “stay in” ? What??
This is not “SlipperHeads”!!
While snow down to Sallanches is not so very frequent the approach roads to almost anywhere around do get snow fairly frequently. I would certainly want snow tyres (all of HS needs “winter equipment” this year) and given the marginal cost, I’d be spaffing out for AWD.
To be fair to Sallanches, it is probs a good location for exploring and has been bootstrapping itself in allure in recent years.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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@under a new name, I did also say 'or catch a bus to St Gervais'.
Someone asked a question predominantly about long-term car hire and that would be my view (also I have stayed in Sallanches and driven for day trips in nearby resorts, so the post caught my attention for that reason). If it's really heavy snow, and lifts were closed, I might just 'stay in' - especially if I was skiing for a month or two. Like I said, just an opinion and a reply to the original post. However, I do appreciate that there are others who post on this site and have done so for a far longer time than me, so I can understand that the idea of 'staying in' may be alien to the die-hard and not be an appropriate term for this web forum (apologies, I did not mean to offend!).
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@YellowAndBlue, you certainly did not offend me. 
And thinking about if, one very important point (for me) for @Vegemite skiier would be that if it's snowing at 1,000m, it's quite (very?) likely to be raining in Sallanches, so what you see out your window on a weather day is not representative (necessarily) of conditions up the hill.
Your comment about "long" term rental did set me thinking. I wonder why that is? Did rental companies turn cars over that quickly?
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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I know Sallanches and some of the surrounding resorts quite well and agree with UANN that a car with winter tyres is highly desirable to make the best use of the skiing opportunities. Winter tyres are not legally required in Sallanches (or anywhere else in France) but if you don't have them chains will sometimes be essential to get to anywhere where you can ski. Sometimes the police won't let you up the road without them - and when that happens you know the skiing is likely to be brilliant! But even when there is no snow around, you must legally have them available in the car.
I think the car problem is pretty easily solved, as suggested, by renting a car with winter tyres and preferably 4WD in Geneva. I'd be more exercised by how to organise lift passes!
The drive through the Mont Blanc tunnel to the Dolomites is no big deal - I've done it several times. The cost (a day's car rental, tolls and fuel) is likely to be a lot less than doing it any other way and you can take all your clobber with you.
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@pam w, winters or chains will be obligatory this winter, in many areas, including the haute savoie ...
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The OP has another thread where they describe why they picked Sallanches.
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@under a new name, yes, I did say that chains will be legally required - I think the rule is that they are only legally required if you don't have winter tyres. But personally, except for people with bomb-proof 4wd, I'd always advise chains in addition. The rules in France are now, AIUI, the same as in northern Italy.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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@under a new name, sorry, I should've described it better. By 'long-term' car hire, I suppose I was referring to my own experiences whereby anything over 28 days seemed to get treated quite differently by car rental companies at the airport. Rental offers were harder to come by (often non-existent) and the per day price was far greater. It might be different now, but 28 days at a time was fine for me and I didn't mind a trip to Alicante airport once per month. It was incredible value too. I did wonder why the 28 day cut-off was so significant, the only things I could think of were 1) the rental companies' insurance policies stating individual rental time limits of 28 days per rental and 2) that the car hire companies, especially down in Spain, preferred very short rentals where they could flog excess waiver policies.
It could be completely different now and France might well be quite different to Spain. If chains and winter tyres are now a legal requirement, and as others have mentioned, it's easy to get the train down from Paris to Geneva or Lyon where the they should be readily available. I'd still look at one car for France and at least one car for Italy. If you have a breakdown whilst in, say, Naples, and your rental location is at Lyon airport, and with local rental offices operating as franchisees, could be a minefield. Again, just my own opinion. But 3 x 1 month rentals is how I'd look at doing it.
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The other thread discussing skiing from Sallanches is at https://snowheads.com/ski-forum/viewtopic.php?p=4998270&highlight=sallanches#4998270 which yet again propagates the erroneous ideas that:
- winter tyres are now obligatory throughout much of the French Alps
- if you have a vehicle with winter tyres you won't need chains
- any cars rented in those areas will have winter tyres so you can wash your hands of chains (rather than having to rub them on your trousers after you've fitted the damn things).
All myths.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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@YellowAndBlue, yeah I think I’d possibly be doing two “local” contracts as well, unless getting very explicit clearance for cross border use (it is sometimes expressly restricted) …
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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When I rented a car in Gva recently I had to pay a (modest) additional fee for cross-border use as we were taking it into France. I don't recall having done this in the past.
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| under a new name wrote: |
| unless getting very explicit clearance for cross border use (it is sometimes expressly restricted) … |
Think you're over egging this. Since the suggestion is to take a train to Geneva and rent there, I can confirm that I've rented loads of cars over the years from Geneva airport Swiss side through AutoEurope and never had any issue with going cross border to France. It's just a box on the booking form that you tick and name the country you're going to. No hassle, no surcharge, no issue. I've used Budget, Hertz, Avis, Europcar, Enterprise, Sixt - none of them could care less about going cross border as long as it's on the booking form. I've even got free upgrades by being nice and telling them I'm going to the French Alps (props to Hertz for this).
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You know it makes sense.
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| pam w wrote: |
| When I rented a car in Gva recently I had to pay a (modest) additional fee for cross-border use as we were taking it into France. I don't recall having done this in the past. |
I've just done a dummy booking on AutoEurope GVA Swiss side for travel to France - price is the same. Maybe it's an AutoEurope T&Cs thing with the rental companies that they can't put a surcharge on.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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^^ Or could be a difference between summer and winter rental? In winter they know a significant proportion of renters will be going to France rather than Switzerland so cross border use is already built in to the price.
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Poster: A snowHead
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I'd never paid it until this last time. It was an "added extra" at the airport - as far as I recall there was no field on the booking form for listing which countries you were visiting. This was with Sixt, Swiss side.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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@pam w, did you book through an agent or direct?
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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I booked direct on the sixt website
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Yeah, maybe that's it then. I've only ever used AutoEurope for GVA. Have done the odd comparison with AE's prices and booking direct and AE have always been much cheaper but YMMV.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Just checked on my invoice. "Voyage a l'étranger"was fr 23.21, one off charge, for the four days, but additional driver and hefty "local supplement" (eh?) all added to the initial bill. Good job there were three of us sharing the cost.
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FWIW, I've always thought Sixt are the dearest of all the major renters so I'm not surprised they found a way to put some extra charges in. They have "premium" brand cars, usually VAG group but you definitely pay for it.
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| Quote: |
Think you're over egging this. Since the suggestion is to take a train to Geneva and rent there, I can confirm that I've rented loads of cars over the years from Geneva airport Swiss side through AutoEurope and never had any issue with going cross border to France.
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I'd agree with you about hiring a car in Geneva and being able to drive between France and Switzerland fairly easily, but the OP is looking to take the car to northern Italy and then southern Italy as well (as I understand it). Would that be so easy? I genuinely don't know, but it always has seems to me that cross-border travel with hire cars presents problems. Maybe I've become over-cautious when hiring cars abroad, but I think I'd double-check if I was planning to take a car from Geneva to southern Italy.
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Well given that the OP is landing in Paris, if he goes on (for example) Europcar.fr, they offer cars for hire with winter tyres from Paris CDG and in the FAQ section they state that it is permissible to take the car cross border with some general disclaimer BS that basically means you have to tell them up front and agree it as a condition of the rental.
So renting from GVA and crossing two borders is unnecessary, the OP can get what they want directly from Paris.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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I would not trust a car rental company to provide winter tires even if they said they were on there. I think the norm is 4WD with all season tires.
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FAQ
