Posted on 03/16/2011 8:08:04 AM PDT by MalPearce
I spent last week in Massachusetts and broke my "driving on the right" cherry at last, but then I got the shock of my life...
No cats' eyes, on any road, anywhere.
When I arrived in the country, it was dark, raining and slightly misty, and once I got out onto the I-93 northbound and had stopped putting the wipers on when indicating my turns, if anything it got even harder to drive. This was because I had a real job working out where the lane markings were. Even the cruddy Garmin sat-nav in the hire car didn't seem to know what road I was on never mind which lane I was in. Eventually I had to rely on where the car in front of me, appeared to be, and just hope they could see better than I could. But when I got into the office a colleague there said whole rows of cars end up in the ditch when people do that in bad weather.
Given the sheer quantities of snow still lying around in the area, I guess that's a real challenge which is why I'd be interested to know if any Freepers who've travelled in the United Kingdom can venture an opinion on whether or not the ubiquitous reflective cats' eyes we have, or indeed the "The filter lane for the exit you need is coming up in three, two, one, NOW" kind of fluorescent/reflective motorway signage we have in Blighty, made it easier for you to adjust to driving on the wrong side of the road in poor visibility conditions.
In the US, we say "wyre in the tire".
IMHO from an Idaho country boy who just about peed his britches last time my bud picked me up at the airport there. 90 FReepin' mph through a snowstorm and we wuzn't even in the fast lane. Just damn.
Let’s face it, you probably don’t need power steering for long distance driving in New Mexico. Just lash the wheel into position, engage cruise control, and you’re good to go!
I can take the country route to work, if I fancy driving down a lane that’s no more than eight feet wide, hedges 9 feet high on each side most of the way, blind summits and random S bends galore, up hill and down dale, 1:4 gradients in places. At the far end summit is a hard left turn, flanked by ditches on each side. On a clear summer day, it’s perilous (if you drive slow enough not to crash into a tractor coming the other way you then have a three mile blind reverse to get to a safe overtaking spot) but darned good fun.
Since hardly any Brits switches over to winter tyres and snow chains are verboten over here, the journey to the office, despite only being seven miles, is one heck of an adrenaline rush if we’ve had a bit of snow.
I’m currently driving a Beamer 3 series station wagon, 1.9 turbo diesel, 2WD (front), plus run-flats. Power steering tuned to the point where you can make course corrections with a cotton bud. There’s no spare wheel because of the run-flats, so a huge sack of potatoes needs to be left in the back until the thaw.
Power steering is good because you need a hand free for your beer.
When you move to New Mexico, they stop you at the border, check you for contraband, then the “official greeter” comes over and yanks your turn signal level out saying “You won’t be needing this anymore!”
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