… South African Style. Aside from the cheery note “Driving in SA is as safe as any other country BUT DO NOT ON ANY ACCOUNT UNLOCK YOUR DOORS, LOOK AT ANYONE IN A FUNNY WAY, OR PARK ANYWHERE THAT IS NOT SURROUNDED BY A SWAT TEAM” from the South African Tourist board, there was also this nugget of usefulness:
“At a 4-way stop intersection, vehicles from all 4 directions must stop at the stop sign before proceeding to cross the intersection. With more vehicles stopping at the intersection, the rule is first one to stop is first one to move. If vehicles stop at the same time, common courtesy applies and either vehicle may proceed first.”
Now I’m English and multi skilled in queuing so I am going to be there for DAYS. “No, No after you, I’m fine here and anyway you’ve got a gun rack, so that definitely gives you priority”
Due to almost everybody flying to Johannesburg this weekend, my journey to our office starts at midday tomorrow and finishes sometime early Sunday morning. There are many things I love about living here, but I will concede that Birmingham is not a proper international Airport.
“South Africa?” replied the shocked looking travel person “From Birmingham?” “Weeeel, you could if you left last Tuesday and are happy to cross Nigeria by Camel“. That’ll be a trip to Heathrow then, with an alledged upside that the Virgin lounge is like no other on the planet.
Apparently you can even get a haircut. Well that’s clearly sold it for old “MonkTop” back here.
So look after the old Hedgy while I am away. I shall be suffering in 28 degrees, under Summer sunshine situated in a hotel with an outdoor pool and bar. And probably being car jacked, worked to within an inch of my being, and crashing into innocent citizens as I attempt to orientate the map on the steering wheel.
we can’t surely be the only effing country to have worked out the roundabout? How effing difficult can it be?
effing foreigners, pointless they are
” 4-way stop intersection”
he’s not talking bout a roundabout
effing nationals 😉
france has figured out roundabouts. You just drive at them really fast, on the wrong side of the road obviously. As you enter the roundabout itself, ducktape the horn down, accelerate and amuse yourself by reading a book or smoking a cigarette. When you are bored, look for an exit which looks interesting, make sure you’re in the inside lane and then exit the roundabout whilst accelerating/reading a book/smoking, etc, etc.
… not forgetting that france changed the prioity rules on roundabouts but omitted to tell all the old people. Something my host let me know AFTER 200 confusing miles of alpine road biking.
i drove round a few roundabouts in america.. again the locals seemed a bit confused by the ‘priority to oncoming traffic’ anyone who’s seen the arc de triomph will understand that just doesn’t work!
mind you they are americans so they’ve probably never left the country.
I was chatting to an american and apparently they’ve just put a roundabout in at the end of his street, in order to ease everyone in gently they’ve put up cones to funnel people the correct way.. the cones have been out a month and this chap said they have to be replaced everyday as some nugget or other pancakes them.. gawd bless the colonies
Talk amongst yourselves as I’m struggling to stay awake in the face of stifling heat and some extremely dull technical documentation. Arrived alive, wrote something arsey – predictably about posh people – I’ll post when I get a minute, saw some lions from about 2 feet away,was more frightened by drive into the office this morning.
“hello sir, can we panhandle you today? No? How about an upgrade to being shot in the face?” Scary, I tell you. Properly scary 😉
Soup!
I got in a taxi today and found that taxi drivers in Jo’burg don’t bother with the 4-way stop intersection rule, or most other rules come to think of it…
I had a similar experience on the way to the airport last night, wet roads, rush hour, complete absence of any road sense whatsoever. I just closed my eyes and waited for it to end.