Ken Saxon in France

A 63-year-old, unemployed and forced into early retirement, now drawing Social Security and one other even smaller retirement check, and living cheaply on the French Riviera, eating great food, drinking superb but inexpensive wines, losing weight, getting healthy, soaking up some sun, learning a new word a day in French, going to wonderful jazz and blues concerts, meeting new French friends, and wondering why Bacillus francophobus is so virulent in the United States.


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How to convert kilomètrage to mileage

Learning to think metric is somewhat like learning another language. I'm an American raised on ounces and pounds, inches and feet, and after several months in France I find that I still am trying to do mental conversion math in my head, with some difficulty. I am now fairly comfortable with the weights and measures necessary to buy groceries, but other metric aspects of daily life are sometimes difficult.

Recently, I saw an advertisement for an automobile claiming great fuel economy, consuming only 6.5 liters per 100 kilometers. My American reaction was to ask myself, "How many miles per gallon?" This requires a double conversion of litres to gallons and kilometers to miles, then divided by 100. Far too complex for my mind. Surely, I thought, there must be a simple formula.

I then did a Google search and found a formula that easy enough for me to understand.

The following information is from a great Web site that offers a variety of useful information for English-speaking people who have just to moved to France. The site is run by the Kiechle Family, who are Americans living in nearby Valbonne. Some of this family's Web site is for family members only, but there are many pages of helpful information that I have not found elsewhere on the web. There are sections on Arrival, Employment, Education, Health care, Housing, Transportation, Shopping, Leisure, Useful Info and Contacts.

Gasoline consumption

In the United States, gasoline consumption is measured in miles per gallon; in most of Europe, it is measured in liters per 100 kilometers. The conversion is a bit tedious, knowing that there are 1.609 kilometers to the mile and 3.785 liters to the US gallon. A very quick, and nevertheless amazingly accurate shortcut consists in dividing 235 by the number of miles that can be driven per gallon; the result is the number of liters consumed for 100 kilometers driven. Similarly, dividing 235 by the number of liters required to drive 100 kilometers yields the number of miles that one can drive with a gallon of gasoline. In the UK, imperial gallons are used (there are 4.546 liters to an imperial gallon). Simply substitute the number 282 for 235 when dealing with imperial gallons.

For example:

Convert 8.5 liters/100km to miles per (US) gallon:
235 / 8.5 = 27.65 MPG

Convert 30 miles per (imperial) gallon to liters/100km:
282 / 30 = 9.4 liters/100 km

Speed

One of the most often used conversions is the one from kilometers per hour (kph) to miles per hour (mph) and vice versa. A quick estimate for kph may be obtained by multiplying mph by 10 and dividing the result by 6. Conversely, multiplying kph by 6 and dividing by 10 is a good approximation for mph.

Kilometers per hour = miles per hour times 1.61

Miles per hour = kilometers per hour times 0.621

The Kiechle Family writes that the information on the web site took a long time to prepare. "In fact, it is a bit of an afterthought in that we had no plans to include this type of information when this web site was initially set up. In the meantime, though, we have received a great many emails from all over the world asking us what it is like to live here, how the health care system, works, whether there are international schools in the area, and so on. Many of these have come from people who had either signed contracts to work in this area or had at least contemplated moving here. Though this section is titled 'Moving to France' we have no first-hand experience with areas other than the French Riviera, more specifically Sophia Antipolis. While some of the information in this section may apply to other parts of France, most is specific to the area we live in. Not all the information presented in these pages deals with moving; much pertains to certain aspects of living and working here."

A very good web site. It's worth a visit and some reading.

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