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Driving from Calais to Val Di Fassa

 Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
Hi All, am after picking a few knowledgeable brains if someone could be so kind, please?
We are lucky enough to be spending some time in the Val Di Fassa this winter and will be driving there from Calais. Have looked at the various driving options and have decided upon the Belgium, Luxembourg, Stuttgart, Ulm, Innsbruck route. Ideally we would like to drive for about 9 hours from Calais before stopping over, which will hopefully leave us about 5 to 6 hours the following day. If route map is to be believed and there are no major hiccups, 9 hours is around about Ulm.
I have been looking for overnight accommodation in this area (preferably not too far off the autobahn), but am concerned that quite a bit of the parking does not look too secure. Not insinuating that there are unscrupulous individuals in these parts but bearing in mind we will have a lot of personal possessions in the car overnight, can anyone recommend a suitable stop over place / accommodation that may have a bit more secure parking?
Also, where would you recommend as a good place (supermarket) for a big shop, prior to reaching Val di Fassa (was thinking within about an hour from Val di Fassa) ?
Would be very grateful if anyone has any knowledge of the above. Thank you
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 Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
I have been to the Val di Fassa most years for the past 10 ...If I am going direct I usually go Calais Lille Luxemboug and have stopped at Pirmasens at the Hotel Schenk small hotel just off the motorway and next door to an Italian restaurant.. last year they were shut so I stopped in Karlsruhe.. it is then a days drive via the Ferne pass and Brenner to the turn off for the Val di Fassa ..as you say Ulm is great stopped there once on the way and stayed in the IBIS which does have secure parking
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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?
Assuming Ulm for your night stop I'd suggest the Hotel Engel in Ulm-Lehr which is a quiet residential area. https://www.hotel-engel-ulm.de/en/
We have stopped there quite a few times (Defender + open trailer) and I've never had any problems with security. The car park (entrance on the left hand side of the hotel) is behind the hotel and has security lighting.
Breakfast is substantial (I have seen families prepare a packed lunch from it, but they were pushing it!) and is served from 06:30 (Mon to Sat), 07:30 Sundays.
Dinner is good. A quirk is that there is a Stübl which acts as a smoking room where dinner can be served legally!
It's close to the motorway and you can take the main road through the city to get the motorway to Füssen.
Once in Austria you do not need a vignette until you get to the Inn Valley and even then you can take the old road (go via Mötz - it cuts out a narrow, twisty stretch). If you are travelling south in Austria on a Saturday there is "flow control" with traffic lights just outside Reutte. Also look for https://www.highline179.tirol/ just south of Reutte.
We fuel up in Schengen which is the easternmost part of Luxembourg on your route. When I drove up six weeks ago fuel was cheaper in Italy than in Germany and Austria (but this could change).

Sorry, can't help you with shopping possibilities, I don't know that area well enough, and it'll depend on the direction you arrive in. Once you've fine tuned the route, look for Aldi, Lidl, Eurospar, Co-op on the valley floors.
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Cant help with the accommodation but some maybe helpful driving bits. Make sure you take the B10 road between Pirmasens & Landau, it is is deliberately not signposted to discourage through traffic in a national park but it is largely dual carriage way and a much more direct & quicker option than going via Kaiserslauten. Watch out for the long term roadworks at Pforzheim, less of an issue at weekends but can be long queues on workdays. I avoid the Fern Pass these days, though maybe the calculation is a bit different from the western side. The pass can get closed in bad weather which causes complete chaos and there can be very long queues at peak weekends (lots of Dutch), you might well be better off going via Bregenz and the Arlberg tunnel. The Austrian's now heavily discourage any transit traffic avoiding the Autobahns, not sure how much legal force there is to this (certain areas officially ban the traffic in the peak summer times, Kufstein is closed to transit traffic) but the Police do try to enforce this even just by stopping obvious holiday vehicles. It generally is not worth avoiding paying for a vignette (you can buy online, makes sure you go to the official asfinag site, https://shop.asfinag.at/en/ , not one of the "agent" sites, say you are a business customer to get immediate validity, also Brenner & Arlberg). Occasionally if there are huge queues on the south side of the Brenner (tolls at Sterzing) it can be worth avoiding the Autostrada but the only exit is hard to spot, just after the tunnel at the summit there is a shop between the carriage ways and a truck park on your right. Immediately after the truck park there is an exit for the SS12 but there is only a single overhead gantry indicating this, it almost looks like another truck park. Italian fuel was a lot cheaper in the summer than Germany or Austria, currently E10 petrol is around €1.90 / litre here.
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 Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
If there are problems on the FernePass you can go via the outskirts of Munich and through Garmisch this route can be quicker I beats some friends coming back that way and we left at the same time ..also this route means you can avoid Austrian autoroutes...and if you want to avoid the Brenner altogether the you can get to Bolzano via the Reschen Pass and Moreno ..its a bit longer but ..anyway we got diverted that way when the Brenner was closed a few years ago
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Hi All, apologies for late reply. Have not been able to log on for a while. Thank you very much for your comprehensive replies. Its very much appreciated.
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