A Guide To Parking Your Car On Holiday
Taking Your Car
Ferries from English ports are very car friendly, and the benefits of taking your car with you speak for themselves. Birmingham airport parking might not appeal to you. Firstly, the packing process is made a thousand times easier and faster. Having packed your suitcases and luggage, you can simply lump them into the back of the car the night before and tick if from your list. Rushing around at 4:00am to catch a flight has long been a dangerous time of poor light and falling over luggage scattered around the home! Driving to your hotel from the docks means that you won't have to worry about finding a taxi, or lugging your belongings to the coach stop. Simply pulling up outside the hotel and removing your suitcases may seem like a given, but you won't realise how much you appreciate it until you have to drag your suitcase with a broken wheel down a long stretch of road.
Second of all, it will save you a lot of time when it comes to activities whilst on holiday. You will have far more freedom in your timing, knowing that you don't have to catch the tourist shuttle buses to the activity parks at certain times. You'll also avoid the chaos that if your final morning of holiday, when you know that you don't have taxis to meet or buses to chase.
Renting A Car
This option is very hit and miss. If you're holidaying to the United States, you will have a lengthy process of gaining an International License, and then transferring it to a Temporary US License. Your own license doesn't qualify you to drive on North American roads.
However, in somewhere like the Canary Islands, you will find it a lot easier. Simply by turning up at the depot, showing them your license and filling out a form, you can drive away in a choice of cars fully covered by insurance. Remember that in warmer countries which attract tourism, the car rental depots on the main high streets or hotel populated areas will be vastly more expensive than those just out of town.
There aren't any affordable commercial airlines that will allow you to fly your car with you internationally; these are only offered by the more expensive privatised functions. If you don't check this beforehand, you could find the Birmingham airport parking the closest your car will get to your hotel.