This won't be short, so grab a brew, I have highlighted our rough costs and included some links, for anyone interested in doing a roadtrip similar to ours.
Our trip started in Manchester, and after a few hours of boring motorways and a slight diversion past Coventry, we made it to Dover.
Our ferry was booked with DFDS Ferries, they were excellent value at £80 return for the both of us: http://www.dfdsseaways.co.uk/
We left Dover at 5am, which left us with a stunning sunrise over the English Channel:
Once in France, we immediately headed (right, as you look at the map) for Belgium (thus avoiding any toll roads). Somewhere in mid Belgium, the toll from the overnight driving was too much, and we stopped for a sleep in a rest stop. It was 38 degrees, so we slept on some concrete benches in the shade! Also got the camera out, naturally:
Our first proper destination, was the Nurburgring Nordshleife.
The DTM was on while we were there, so hotel prices were astronomical/had no vacancies for the Saturday night, so we stayed in a guesthouse called Sliders, that offered a great service, not far from the track, and run by a Brit called Brendan.
http://www.slidersguesthouse.com/
First point to note, is Brendan is an awesome guy, he knows why people stay there, and he caters to it very well. After venturing down to the track for a few hours, we sat with him and some other guests with a beer, watching Frankie Boyle, what more could you ask for!
He is also extremely knowledgeable on the 'ring, and offered us plenty of advice, and a stark warning when he told us that in the 9 years he has run his business, he has lost a total of 6 guests to the Nordschleife.
One room for both of us, was about £80.
Few snaps from our first night down at the town of Nurburg:
Day two say us take on the Nurburgring itself and both do a lap. First thing I will say about the 'ring, is it's utterly terrifying, second thing I will say is, everyone should do it. I loved every corner, every straight, and everytime a 911 Turbo overtook me on full boost, sounding like a rocket!
One lap of the Nurburgring is £20
We grabbed some photos from the entrance to the track, which is basically a who's who of all the best track cars out there!
For our second night we stayed at the Blau Ecke in Adenau:
http://www.blaueecke.de/start/?PHPSE...13a5ae7c2ee231
This was much cheaper for the second night, due to the DTM being over with, so the room came to about £90 for the both of us.
Decent view over the main road too.
As we were leaving we saw that the track was open for a pre-booked trackday, so we stopped and had a quick look around. Few more from the entrance to the track:
After the Nurburgring, we left for Stuttgart, we decided to go through a town called Cochem, which had been reccomended to us by one of the guys at Sliders, well worth the trip:
Would have been nice to have stayed longer, but we needed to get moving to be in Stuttgart in time.
On the Autobahn, we saw signs for Hockenheim, and we couldn't resist, so off we went:
Things didn't quite go to plan, and we got lost and ended up on a very dusty forest road that encircled the track, but we did find this memorial to Jim Clark, it was in the middle of nowhere, with nothing but a forest track leading past it!
On the way into Stuttgart we stopped in Sinsheim, at the Autotechnik centre: http://www.technik-museum.de/
Cost for the museum was £10, but we got it a little cheaper because we were only there for the last hour and a half, and it apparently takes 6 hours to go round everything.
Once in Stuttgart, we stayed at a hotel called the Golden Leaf, laughably cheap at £30 for both of us, and it's about half a mile to the Porsche factory!
http://www.golden-leaf-hotel.de/en/s...ebersicht.html
The next day we went to the Porsche museum, entry is about £5:
Next door to the museum, there is a Porsche showroom, which we had a wander around. Glad we did, as we saw a (probably) priceless Porsche tractor being driven through the showroom by one of the staff!
We also went to the Mercedes museum, but due to time constraints, we decided to just have a look around the showroom, and as it turned out, the carpark too!
Our final destination, and the end of our south headed driving, was Zurich. We stayed in the Swissotel, in Oerlikin, about a 5 min train ride (£5 for a 24 hour pass) from central Zurich.
http://www.swissotel.com/
Our rooom was on the 18th floor and had amazing views. The hotel was also a very very nice place to be, 14th best in Zurich certainly can't be bad
Cost of the room was around £180, for both of us, for 2 nights.
First night, we had a walk around the city centre for a bit.
The next day we spent some time soaking in the heat, and the atmosphere of Zurich, which is a truly lovely city.
We then stumbled across a classic car rally, this was one of the highlights of the holiday for me, some of the rarest cars on the road, all arrived just before we got there. We had a very good look around!
We then headed out of the main centre and down the banks of the lake, where the real money of Zurich started to show itself!
All in all, a fantastic trip, and I wouldn't think twice about doing it again. The Clio was perfect and didn't miss a single beat. 1900 miles, and it did 39.8mpg the whole way
Other costs:
Fuel was about £160 each
Spending money about £450 ish (for me, no idea what Jon spent)
Anybody thinking of doing something like this, just do it. I can't reccomend it enough, and if anyone wants to know anything, please feel free to drop me a PM or something.
Cheers for reading.
