Check your insurance covers the places that you are going to. They are not all the same. Sometimes Spain is included and sometimes not. One insurer included Morocco with Spain. Ditto for Eastern Europe. Get extra cover for breakdown and recovery. Try your usual insurer for the extras. But beware some have big excesses for cars over 10 years old.
Get medical cover. Get the EHIC card first - it's free. Don't go via the "intercept" sites that charge you. We have used various medical insurers. This year we used a company called "EHIC Plus". The EHIC card entitles you to free emergency medical attention in a state hospital. The insurance covers things that are not free. There are also high risk sports that are extra. check the small print. But you may fine cheaper. There's some sensible advice on the Martin Lewis "moneysavingexpert" website.
You need to take hi-vis jackets for anyone who would need to leave the car if you breakdown. Put them on before you leave the car. Ditto if stopped by the police. It's an offence to leave the car without wearing it.
Spare bulbs, incl headlamp.
Second warning triangle.
Worth getting a French environment sticker. Their areas are not just town centres. Some rural areas are included. Again there are "intercept sites" to avoid.
https://www.certificat-air.gouv.fr/en/ Each environment area is decided by the local authority. Only Paris, Grenoble and Lille today, but most major cities and some national parks will be added this year. For about £5, not worth the risk of a big fine. Order it now. French bureaucracy is slow.
Germany does the same. Get an umweltplakette. €6 from a German official source. I used berlin.de as recommended by the AA.
Driving...
Roundabouts are the hardest to learn. Needs a week or two to get the hang of going round the wrong way.
The Europeans have introduced roundabouts in the last 10 years. They don't understand them. The French drive around the outside edge, so don't expect a car adjacent to the kerb approaching you, turning off the roundabout. On most main roundabouts, the French have painted the road so that only one lane enters the roundabout. They can't handle two lanes, apparently. It confuses them. The Germans are learning but they tend to panic at roundabouts.
When you get tired, you will make mistakes. Make sure you agree with all the other passengers that they can back seat drive without the driver getting cross. Also applies to leaving a one-way street turning onto a two-way road. Easy to automatically go to the wrong side.
Satnav is usually OK, but putting the position of speed cameras on them is illegal in France and Switzerland.
Speed limits are 130km/hr on French motorways and 110km/hr if it's raining. Other countries are much the without the change when raining. Maybe 120 or 110 km/hr depending on the country. Germany has the same limit, but it's advisory unless there's an actual limit shown.
If there's a queue on the road, traffic moves to both edges to allow emergency vehicles down the middle. The hard shoulder is, apparently, for breakdowns,not emergency vehicles.
Look at French supermarket websites - Auchan, E Leclerc, Carrefour, Geant, etc. Some have a free app for locating their stores. Petrol is much cheaper there than on the motorway or in the country.
Not sure about headlamp adjustment. Saab only seem to mention it for the 9-5 after 2006. I just turn mine down a couple of turns.
That'll do for now...
