I have just returned to London after spending the holidays in Belgium and Holland. Due to the nature of the trip, I opted to drive rather than fly.

I found the experience of the Dover-Calais ferry crossing to be a complete eye-opener in terms of security, compared to flying.

Both Mrs Mee and I are non-EU citizens living in the UK. On arrival at the port of dover, we were waved through both British and French passport control. We then arrived at the check-in counter, where I presented a print-out of our booking. We were handed a tag to hang on the rear-view mirror, and directed to the vessel, and boarded after a short wait.

Note: so far no-one had looked at our passports, or inspected our car or luggage! (And the vessel can hold 700 vehicles and 2000 people)

On the return crossing, we were again waved through French passport control, but were stopped by the British. We were also briefly stopped at customs / security before boarding, but all they did was glance in our boot.

What I cant figure out is whether we were lucky, or whether (compared to airlines) the security is extremely lax, making these ferries a target, considering that one car-bomb on board could risk the lives of 2000 people...

-- Mike