Hi all, just came off the phone to Norfolk Line, and I am still grinding my teeth!
The good news folks is they have return crossings for a car in August for as little as £48.00 if you pick your times carefully... and that car can be up to 10 m long, the bad news is... put a 3m trailer on the back of your 3m car and the fare becomes... £210.00 - The same price as if you take a huge caravan!
The lady on the end of the phone says it is because 'trailers have to go on another deck..!" Basically they are keeping it cheap for commercial vehicles (who shouldn't be shifting stuff across the seas with global warming anyway!) and expensive for us !
OK, rant over... maybe we wont say 'stuff it... it is going to rain... no way are we going to Scotland, lets get a ferry and head south' after all!!! '
lol Jackie XXX
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Unless you specially want to use Norfolk Lines, have you tried Speedferries - a large vehicle is classed as anything under 7 metres, including trailer. I've just had a quote for £79.00 - going out at 18.00 hrs on 09/08/07, and back at 09.50 on 24/08/07 for car and trailer. I didn't think that was too bad.
It's worth enquiring with other ferry companies too. For example, on Hull-Zeebrugge, trailers and caravans are free on Saturday and Sunday nights.
We used Speedferries 2 years ago, and it was the roughest crossing I have ever known - you couldn't walk across the vessel without holding on to walls/tables, and lots of people were being seasick - not an ideal start to a holiday, and one that we'll never repeat! Yes it was in July too.
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Hi all, just came off the phone to Norfolk Line, and I am still grinding my teeth!
The good news folks is they have return crossings for a car in August for as little as £48.00 if you pick your times carefully... and that car can be up to 10 m long, the bad news is... put a 3m trailer on the back of your 3m car and the fare becomes... £210.00 - The same price as if you take a huge caravan!
The lady on the end of the phone says it is because 'trailers have to go on another deck..!" Basically they are keeping it cheap for commercial vehicles (who shouldn't be shifting stuff across the seas with global warming anyway!) and expensive for us !
OK, rant over... maybe we wont say 'stuff it... it is going to rain... no way are we going to Scotland, lets get a ferry and head south' after all!!! '
lol Jackie XXX
How else are we going to get out French wines across the sea to keep us happy for the rest of the year?
You should have checked first really. Generally it is always going to be more expensive if you have a trailer of van with you.
Basically they are keeping it cheap for commercial vehicles (who shouldn't be shifting stuff across the seas with global warming anyway!) and expensive for us !
If it was not for the freight travelling in both directions then there would be far less ferry companies and choice of routes and consequently the rates to cross the channel would be a lot higher due to supply and demand.
If you are that concerned about global warming why are you polluting the atmosphere driving your car all this way and then using a ferry when you could cycle to your local campsite ??
It works both ways.
------------- Tony
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Dear oh dear, no need to get funny, it was just a passing tongue in cheek comment! But for the record, our car runs on LPG, which is a much it is a greener fuel, the kids walk to school and I lift share, we buy nearly all our food from local producers - I could go on.... this is the only time in a year when we go further than an hour away! The stuff being shifted that is unceccesary that I was referring to is stuff like veg and salad - polish tomatoes being sold by Tesco in July and New Zealand apples in September - it is madness in my opinion... obviously there are goods that we all buy which need to be freighted to us, but we all should be more self sufficient as an island!
Hey Jackie I agree 100 percent about buying local produce which I do however I also work for a international shipping company so sit on both sides of the fence.
Getting back to the original point I took our trailer to the local forge who managed to chop 5 inches off the towbar without affecting the handling of the trailer in anyway which now means my MPV and trailer come in at 696 cms. This was specifically done so we can travel on Speedferries and their 700 cms limit and last year paid GBP 78 return. Had to pay more this year as we booked a lot later but think it was still only £ 140.
Dear oh dear, no need to get funny, it was just a passing tongue in cheek comment! But for the record, our car runs on LPG, which is a much it is a greener fuel, the kids walk to school and I lift share, we buy nearly all our food from local producers - I could go on.... this is the only time in a year when we go further than an hour away! The stuff being shifted that is unceccesary that I was referring to is stuff like veg and salad - polish tomatoes being sold by Tesco in July and New Zealand apples in September - it is madness in my opinion... obviously there are goods that we all buy which need to be freighted to us, but we all should be more self sufficient as an island!
Jackie
Well, one thing's for sure; you won't be travelling via Eurotunnel!
Basically they are keeping it cheap for commercial vehicles (who shouldn't be shifting stuff across the seas with global warming anyway!) and expensive for us !
In their defence, I think the issue is more one of Norfolk Line being a primarily Freight company than a leisure travel company, and carry leisure travellers on their top deck which is up a spiral ramp. A trailer would probably get stuck on this, and therefore a trailer would be on the freight deck for which they would probably take a lot more money than the cost they are charging you. Im not sure they are keeping it cheap for Freight users.
As an aside, the Polish tomatoes you saw in Tesco were probably not carried on a cross channel ferry. That would be far too environmentally friendly for Tesco. They probably flew them over instead!
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Quote: Originally posted by Dripping_Wet on 09/7/2007
Hey Jackie I agree 100 percent about buying local produce which I do however I also work for a international shipping company so sit on both sides of the fence.
Getting back to the original point I took our trailer to the local forge who managed to chop 5 inches off the towbar without affecting the handling of the trailer in anyway which now means my MPV and trailer come in at 696 cms. This was specifically done so we can travel on Speedferries and their 700 cms limit and last year paid GBP 78 return. Had to pay more this year as we booked a lot later but think it was still only £ 140.
Now that's determination - I reckon you should put that on the moneysaving expert site! Well done you! Jackie
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Topic: Ferry rip off for trailers
The same price as if you take a huge caravan!
