Driving in France. Speeding tickets are interesting.

[EDManual]

I've been over here near Geneva for the past 3 months, and love the driving. Coming back Thursday and am dreading the driving...

I'm near the alps so the roads are awesome of course, no lines on the roads on the twisty stuff, all 90 zones. Hard to hit 90 a lot of the time!

Anyway, the what I like about France is they put the responsibility on you in every aspect of life. I'm not used to that, being from Australia! You want to wear thongs on the go kart, go for it. No helmets on a bike, no problems, kids over about 6 are in the trees on rope courses by themselves learning about life and how important it is to look after your own safety.

Now with speeding tickets, it's pretty good! Would you believe up to 20 kph over in a zone faster than a 50 zone is a 45 euro fine! And if you are dumb enough to get caught by a speed camera that you didn't see you deserve it, they are easy to see. There is a lovely 10% leeway on non fixed radar and 5% on fixed. So as many people do, they are happy to get a 45 euro fine and but miss the fixed radars and run the gauntlet of actual cops, of which there are almost none! So in a 130 zone you sit on 143 for no fine, or if you don't mind a little one, you do the 130 + 20 + 10%= 165.

In zones of 50 or less the fines are double, which is absolutely fair.