c2R wrote: ↑Mon Sep 03, 2018 07:25
I've had all sorts of these types of questions over the years. The French were once concerned I was smuggling drugs _into_ France and the Germans thought I could be a football hooligan in my UK plate car - it just happened I was entering the country when some sort of football championship was on in the country. It would have had to have been quite an elaborate plan to avoid detection to have done the journey in such a way to be entering via Puttgarden though! One year, customs in Finland also seemed concerned that they wanted to see my driving licence, despite having driven through seven countries before getting there - no worries at all about passports or car documentation. Needless to say British customs was always fun in an empty left hand drive car travelling on my own when I was much younger.
Yes, it's interesting to see what different countries at different times have bees in their bonnet about. When I crossed from Hungary to Croatia in 1997 (long before either was a member of the EU) they couldn't give a fig about my driving licence but they pored over the insurance document for ages. From Slovenia to Croatia the year before, I got the slightly peculiarly phrased demand "If you're carrying any weapons or ammunition, we need to see them" - not a clear statement that such items are forbidden, just that they want to take a look.
The biggest delays I've had have also been with British customs, at Dover when driving a UK-registered car in my own name. I have to admit getting a bit short with the customs official when he asked me the registration number of the car followed by unnecessarily involved questions about where I was going. This followed a perfectly reasonable request to open the boot and show what I was carrying. I can understand that if a car is stolen, the driver may well not know the number, but there are so many other genuine circumstances where a driver doesn't know the number that it hardly constitutes evidence of wrongdoing, especially when coupled with a simple check on who the registered keeper is together with my driving licence. I had a high fever, felt like dung and told him to go and look at the front of the car. I suspect he realised I was ill and chose avoiding being infected over making life difficult for me, as he just waved me on resignedly.
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Oddest experience I had with a customs man was at Calais. He pulled a sealed biscuit tin from the boot and asked me what was in it. "Biscuits" was my obvious reply, at which point he unsealed it, opened it, and found it to be full of biscuits. And then he stopped searching.
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Big L wrote: ↑Mon Sep 03, 2018 17:54
Oddest experience I had with a customs man was at Calais. He pulled a sealed biscuit tin from the boot and asked me what was in it. "Biscuits" was my obvious reply, at which point he unsealed it, opened it, and found it to be full of biscuits. And then he stopped searching.
I may have mentioned this before, but from 1994-96 I worked in Brussels. I was in my mid 20s. I had a Belgian registered car but spoke very little French and no Dutch/Flemish, so I aroused curiosity as soon as I opened my mouth. I used to come home to the UK from time to time by ferry or Le Shuttle. I used to get stopped more often than not at Calais and Dover. The funniest occasion was when Calais customs went through a whole bin bag of dirty washing piece by piece. It was very difficult to resist smirking.
murphaph wrote: ↑Sun Sep 02, 2018 22:42
The Rettungsgasse is unfortunately not universally implemented, even by many German drivers. The A100 has frequent tailbacks and the adherence is pretty poor along it in my experience living here.
Coupled to that you have a lot of foreign transit vehicles who have no idea they should be creating a Rettungsgasse during tailbacks and it can be really hit and miss.
It's a shame because the idea is really sound. I'd like to see standardisation of a lot more stuff like this at the EU level.
I've just read that the adaptive cruise control and other intelligent/safety systems on the forthcoming electric Mercedes EQC which was unveiled yesterday automatically position the car in the offset "Rettungsgasse" position when approaching motorway queues in this context.
The only hold-up I've ever had at Dover-Calais customs was on the French side on one of the (many) occasions when I've had the car absolutely jam-packed with wine. The French security official was so amused that he called his mate over to see it, before smiling at me and waving me on my way. I thought it better not to tell them that the wine was Italian and not French.
