Driving in France

It looks like driving in France is somehow a nightmare for non French.
Here are some of the rules to help you finding your way :

Firstly get a Michelin map when renting your car, it will help you a lot.

There is nowadays only 2 types of Road
- The "Autoroute" or highway.
Most of them are with toll (you can use your credit card to pay at the barrier) and can prove rather expensive.
Speed limit is 110km/h or 130 km/h.
Speed is limited to 110 km/h everywhere in case of rain or pollution
The sign to Autoroute will always be in blue.

- The "Departementale" are all the other roads (the national which we used to have do not exist any longer)

When looking for your direction, we only refer to cities and never or hardly use the road number (dont ask a French the way to the D99 ....)

Three colours are used for sign posting.
- Blue for Autoroute
- Green for large city
- White for local destination

So when going from one place to another on a map you need to look out for the main city (which will also be in green on your michelin map) on the road you need to take to reach your destination. And then look out for the white signpost when you get nearer to your destination (about 20/25km).