MM way to learn to drive a stick

hoffse · October 2014

Hello,

So H and I are tentatively planning our 2015 vacation, and it's likely going to involve renting a car over in France for a week. Should be good times, but the car rental costs an additional $125 plus a 30 euro tax if we go with an automatic transmission.

Neither of us drives a stick, and we don't know anybody who does (who would let us borrow their car to learn). I actually just looked up to see if you could rent a stick in the US for a day so H could learn before we go, but there's not a stick to be found in our city or even Atlanta - not even at the Atlanta airport where people are flying in from Europe every day.

Any thoughts on a MM way to learn how to do this? It's a pretty big difference in price, and this probably won't be the only time in our lives that we rent a car over there. So this would be a good skill to learn ASAP.

The only thing I can find online is a "stick shift school" but that costs $160. Granted, if we ever rented a car over there again we would come out ahead, but it wouldn't save us any money over just renting an automatic on this trip.

I'm sort of inclined to just have H watch youtube videos and then figure it out when we get the car, but I do recognize that this is not the most responsible choice ever. I'm also not inclined to let H learn at a car dealership... that seems dishonest.

Thoughts?

MrsAshleyH10 · October 2014

Honestly, the thought of being a new manual transmission driver in a foreign country would scare the crap out of me. I would just pay the extra and know you're much more likely to get where you are going safely and without the frustration.

hoffse · October 2014

MrsAshleyH10 said:

Honestly, the thought of being a new manual transmission driver in a foreign country would scare the crap out of me. I would just pay the extra and know you're much more likely to get where you are going safely and without the frustration.

Yeah that's probably true. Driving in a foreign country doesn't scare me. The French drive on the same side of the road as Americans, and we would not be driving in one of the big cities like Paris or anything. In fact, most of our driving will be on very slow roads past farms and things. But yeah, l know that just having at it when we get the rental is not the best idea.

We might do the stick driving school. It ends up being about the same cost as the automatic transmission, and then if we ever rent overseas again we would be saving that money.

vlagrl29 · October 2014

I would pay the extra for automatic, but that's just me. I would hate to have to learn to drive a stick.

als1982 · October 2014

Another vote for paying the extra for an automatic. This seems like a silly, and possibly dangerous, way to save what is going to equate to a very small percentage of the cost of your vacation.

smerka · October 2014

My husbands car is a stick and I still get stressed out when I drive it. I think you'd enjoy the drive better with an automatic.

formerlyGDaisy09 · October 2014

I drive manual....based on my learning experience it took me 2-3 months to really be comfortable driving in busy area, are you going to be in a city or out in the country while you're there?

If you're going to be in the country, you guys can absolutely learn on the go...play first in the parking lot to find that sweet-spot between the clutch and the gas and don't panic if you stall, just restart the car and keep going. also the e-break can be your friend when getting into gear on a hill

really once it's in gear it's pretty easy to figure out, getting going in first or reverse is the tricky part that takes some practice. after that it's just listening/feeling the car and determinig when you need to change gears base on that (RPM can also help with that) the first couple months I had my car I drove with the radio really low so I could hear the engine, since then I drive more by feel.

I'm not picturing city drivers in europe being very friendly to a couple americans stalled in the middle of an intersection, at least for me, while i was learning, that kind of situation with traffic behind me and people honking generally lead to me stalling several times before I could get the car going.

Once you get it, sticks are WAY more fun to drive. H drives that car now and a lot of days I really miss it.

hoffse · October 2014

Yes we would be out in the countryside. Farms, fields, etc. We are planning to stay in a gite (basically a French rental house in the countryside with no neighbors) and just enjoy the area. The closest we would be to a city would be the day we drop the car off at the train station to head into Paris.

Thanks @GDaisy - if it took a few months to get comfortable with it, then we should probably try to rent an automatic just to be safe. The driving school basically made it sound like it's not a difficult thing to learn, and a couple hours with an instructor would cover it.

One of my concerns is that there might not BE any automatics available when we get there. We can certainly try to reserve one, but I've read reports on TA where people reserve an automatic and end up with a stick because the car rental place ran out of them. These small towns only ever have a couple available because everybody over there drives a stick, and sometimes people who arrive before you change their minds about what they want to rent. So it seems like something we should learn the basics of before we leave, regardless of what we reserve.

Let's be clear - I really don't want to drive a stick over there with no practice. I'm wondering if there are any MM ways to become competent with it over here before we leave. Do you think the stick shift lessons would be worthwhile? It WOULD save us money in the long run, but more importantly it wouldn't leave us in a bind if we wind up at the car rental place and the only thing they have available is a stick.

formerlyGDaisy09 · October 2014

you can absolutely get the basics down in a couple hours. just don't expect that a couple hours is going to have you feeling ready to jump into any driving situation. I was out driving myself around in my car in a day, but i pretty much avoided citiy-driving for the first 3 months I owned my car (fortunately I live in the country!).

new manual drivers can also make for a pretty rough ride (honestly I still can't stand the way my H drives stick), if you can get an automatic you'll have a much smoother drive.

I've taught a couple people to drive stick in my car...are you sure you don't know anyone with a truck or something at home? I actually bought a manual on purpose without knowing how to drive it because I thought it was a useful skill to have and knew that there wasn't any other way I'd learn unless I forced myself to. if you lived closer you'd be more than welcome to a lesson

hoffse · October 2014

Gdaisy09 said:

you can absolutely get the basics down in a couple hours. just don't expect that a couple hours is going to have you feeling ready to jump into any driving situation. I was out driving myself around in my car in a day, but i pretty much avoided citiy-driving for the first 3 months I owned my car (fortunately I live in the country!).

new manual drivers can also make for a pretty rough ride (honestly I still can't stand the way my H drives stick), if you can get an automatic you'll have a much smoother drive.

I've taught a couple people to drive stick in my car...are you sure you don't know anyone with a truck or something at home? I actually bought a manual on purpose without knowing how to drive it because I thought it was a useful skill to have and knew that there wasn't any other way I'd learn unless I forced myself to. if you lived closer you'd be more than welcome to a lesson

Ha - thanks!

I'll ask around to see if somebody has a stick that I'm unaware of. Otherwise, I might send H to stick shift lessons so that he's at least familiar with how it works. I think we will still try to rent an automatic on this trip, but at least that way we aren't in trouble if the car rental place runs out before we get there. If we continue to rent cars overseas, it's almost certain that one day we will run into that situation where it's stick shift or nothing. It apparently happens a lot.

formerlyGDaisy09 · October 2014

hoffse said:

Gdaisy09 said:

you can absolutely get the basics down in a couple hours. just don't expect that a couple hours is going to have you feeling ready to jump into any driving situation. I was out driving myself around in my car in a day, but i pretty much avoided citiy-driving for the first 3 months I owned my car (fortunately I live in the country!).

new manual drivers can also make for a pretty rough ride (honestly I still can't stand the way my H drives stick), if you can get an automatic you'll have a much smoother drive.

I've taught a couple people to drive stick in my car...are you sure you don't know anyone with a truck or something at home? I actually bought a manual on purpose without knowing how to drive it because I thought it was a useful skill to have and knew that there wasn't any other way I'd learn unless I forced myself to. if you lived closer you'd be more than welcome to a lesson

Ha - thanks!

I'll ask around to see if somebody has a stick that I'm unaware of. Otherwise, I might send H to stick shift lessons so that he's at least familiar with how it works. I think we will still try to rent an automatic on this trip, but at least that way we aren't in trouble if the car rental place runs out before we get there. If we continue to rent cars overseas, it's almost certain that one day we will run into that situation where it's stick shift or nothing. It apparently happens a lot.

you never know when the skill may come in useful. if I go out with friends and we take my car I automatically become the DD because none of my friends can drive my car.

KatieCutie05 · October 2014

my husband drives a stick. he's tried to teach me a few times and each time it usually ends with him smelling his clutch smoking and saying "okay we're done". It doesn't exactly come naturally to me apparently - maybe because i don't understand a darn thing about cars to begin with. it seems like "car guys" can catch on quicker tho.

If driving his car was a complete emergency situation - i could probably do it... but it might take me a while to get there. And if i had to stop on a hill - forget it - we'd be there for hours. but otherwise even after a few times trying i'm still FAR from being comfortable driving on the roads in the US - i wouldn't even touch another countries roads with a 10 foot pole.

Whats the added cost to rent the car if you end up burning up the clutch? I'd play it safe and just rent the automatic.

maple2 · October 2014

You could advertise on craigslist for someone willing to teach you on their car if you didn't want to pay the full price stick shift school and you can't find a friend who owns one. The cheaper price may not be worth the trade-offs in terms of security and expertise of going with the school, though.

Xstatic3333 · October 2014

I'd pay for the school if there's a chance that you'll show up and have only a stick available. It's worth it for the piece of mind, and like Katie said, it'll come in handy in the future.

brij2006 · October 2014

I would recommend to just pay the extra money for the automatic.

We have 3 cars, and 2 out of the 3 of them are manuals. It definitely takes some getting used to, and not every car is handled the same. So what you may learn on in driving school would be different than what they have in Europe.

My biggest hesitation would be hilly areas. A stick is pretty simple on open flat areas, but get you into a hilly countryside or town and it can quickly become a stressful situation.

I've been driving stick for many years now and I still won't drive it in downtown Chicago, and that is a relatively flat city.

MM way to learn to drive a stick

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