I have not long come back from a most pleasant motoring holiday in the Scottish Highlands. Based primarily near Fort William, at one point we went up the east coast, north of Inverness, through the middle to to top of Scotland (Tongue) and back down the west coast via Ullapool and then back to Fort William, over several days.
Most of the roads were single track and would invariably have police signs stating 'Allow overtaking' with a wee diagram showing a passing place being used. On the main A82, (Fort William to Inverness) there was even a big yellow sign saying 'Frustration causes accidents, allow overtaking'.......and yet........
English tourist numpties insist on ignoring it.........(and i'm English myself)
all the locals play the game and do it very well...and most of the time it was me pulling over for a local as we were looking at the stunning scenery and in no real hurry.....however on day 3 of that jaunt, realising we had over a 100 miles to do on those roads and were meeting relatives at a hotel and wanted to have a bit of quality time at the other end, i decided to push on a bit
twice we got deliberately held up by total carphounds (sorry Lud, i know i've nicked your terminology) who refused to play ball and seemed to go out of their way to keep me behind them....one even deliberately speeding up at a brief two laned bit....WHY?
i could see him and his ugly missus chittering on about it when i eventually got past, couple in their late 50's early 60's.......i'll admit to being most unproffessional with my hand signals when he gave me a load of main beam......why oh why does it bother him what i'm up to?
old twit doesn't even realise it's him committing the offence of 'driving without reasonable consideration for other road users' s3 RTA 1988
there i feel better now
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Wonderful therapy isn't it? :-)
It's all part of the 'I'm alright Jack' attitude that a huge number of drivers seem to adopt these days. As long as they're nice and comfy and enjoying the view then to hell with everybody else on the road.
Can I have some therapy now please?
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I've done thousands of miles on Scottish roads and am concious of letting others past - locals know the roads very well and it could be a member of an emergency service responding to a shout. Locals do aid each other by signalling left when they can see the road ahead is clear. Most drivers not used to passing places think they are only to allow oncoming traffic to pass, they aren't they are also to allow overtaking.
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" a wee diagram showing a passing place".
Ambiguous!
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His take on the situation might be that he was driving along safely if not well, you sailed past him waving a number of fingers at him (Threatening behaviour whereby a breach of the peace might ensue) and he gave you the main beam! I don't see how the beauty or otherwise of his wife affects the issue other than cheapening the value of your comments somewhat.
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His take on the situation might be that he was driving along safely if not well you sailed past him waving a number of fingers at him ....
snipquote
nice try AS.....but difficult to prove a b-o-p might occur if i'm in a totally separate car overtaking and driving away.............unprofessional hand signal was after the main beam, not before and only involved one finger....... as for the aesthetics of his wife, i'd agree that was a secondary issue, but it gave me some pleasure thinking he had to wake up to that every morning
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Westpig - my apolgies. I see that you were clear that your digital gesticulations came AFTER the main beam fracas!
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i usually check to see if the wife is eating pizza as a good clue to their social pretensions,however i have to say i dont like the one fingered gesture even less by women ,the thing is you are bringing yourself down to their level and they arent worth it plus they may decide to take it up a notch and try and ram you off the road or something ,move over move on and forget about them is the way forward in this situation :)
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Most of the roads were single track and would invariably have police signs stating 'Allow overtaking' with a wee diagram showing a passing place being used. English tourist numpties insist on ignoring it.........(and i'm English myself)
How on earth do you know that? Perhaps they're Welsh or Irish numpties, Scottish numpties out to irritate tourists like you, or foreign tourist numpties in hired cars? I find your generalisation rather offensive.
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OK let's call them ethnically non-specific numpties*. I guess that Westpig deduced that they were English possibly from number plates and or emblems attached to the car.
* that is a TIC Comment !
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There are numpties of all sorts everywhere, unfortunately. There are worse, as in the "Both cars stolen" thread, which I was shocked to read. Just sometimes it would be nice to be a policeman, or something.
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English possibly from number plates and or emblems attached to the car.
exactly.......and there was plenty of time to read them
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Up until 10 days ago I had never been to Scotland. However, I was one of a group who drove 12 Caterham Seven sports cars from Lands End to John O' Groats in 2.5 days to raise money for Leukaemia Research!
We went along that road and saw all such signs.
Thankfully, our cars ranged from 140bhp to 600 bhp (yes, 600!!) so we had enough welly to get past the tin tops.
Had we ourselves been in a tintop we would probably chewed off our fingers in frustration and the flat capped Nissan Micra, 'we're retired and have got all the time in the world so you must have as well' type drivers
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Slightly off-thread but congratulations Stuart. Was this reported in any of the car magazines? Maybe you could post a link and some of us might sponsor you in retrospect.
If there's been a thread about this earlier, apologies for missing it.
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Westpig, as one of the locals, I congratulate you on your excellent choice of holiday location, your considerate driving, and your post on a subject which is close to my heart. Haste ye back!
As to the nationalities of the numpties (I prefer the term 'roadhog' myself) - well, it is varied. And if truth be told, a few of the locals are guilty. In my experience, those with foreign registrations are generally courteous - though not always. And they have some excuse, for one can understand how they would be unfamiliar with the Highway code or would have have slightly more difficulty understanding the "Police Notice - use passing places to permit overtaking" than UK drivers. British drivers have no such excuse, and there are some who are not very good at allowing overtaking. Some show a selfishness and thoughtlessness which beggars belief.
It should also be remembered that where a queue builds up because of one of these roadhogs, and it encounters a similar queue going the other way, the passing places are not really big enough to cope.
As you say, drivers who fail to allow following motorists to overtake are committing an offense - and the Highway Code specifically states:
"Single-track roads. These are only wide enough for one vehicle. They may have special passing places. If you see a vehicle coming towards you, or the driver behind wants to overtake, pull into a passing place on your left, or wait opposite a passing place on your right."
Alas, very few of the culprits are apprehended and fined by the Northern Constabulary.
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Been to scotland, enjoyed the scenery, always wondered why they don't install a few more motorways and dual carriageways with the extra money that us English numpties give them!
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Similar numptiness seen on single track/narrow roads in N.Wales - usually English tourists (I'm English too) The usual 'convention' on single track road by locals is to remember the last passing place & make the calculation, when meeting a vehicle coming from the other direction, as to whether you or they back up, manoeuvre completed with cheery wave Well, English tourists can't back up (esp. if they're wimmin) & have little idea of courteous behaviour. I long for the start of school term so all their scrunched up little faces & hideous hyperactive issue go back to thier Barrat boxes in the Midlands, where they can sit forever, stuck on the M6 outside the Ikea in Wednesbury.
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Westpig, couple of years ago we did similar to you - where did you stay "near Fort William"? We were in Glen Roy just along the Inverness road, not far from Spean Bridge and it was fabulous, a great base for travelling.
Re passing places, we decided to take the old 3-car ferry across to Skye and there was a German car on the ferry which got off before me. Once you hit Skye it is a genuine single track road. However the German didn't fully understand the signs, every passing place he got to he would draw in to let people pass, no matter which side of the road it was on!!
Quite a sight seeing cars coming the opposite way braking suddently when they realised that the German was crossing the road to go into the parking place on their side!
--
2007 Seat Altea XL 2.0 TDI (140) Stylance
2005 Skoda Fabia vrS
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Westpig couple of years ago we did similar to you - where did you stay "near Fort William"? We were in Glen Roy just along the Inverness road not far from Spean Bridge and it was fabulous a great base for travelling.
Strontian. Come southbound out of Fort William for 8 miles, take Corran Ferry to Ardnamurchan Peninsula and it's another 14 miles through the usual stunning scenery. Mind the stags though!
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Westpig
Did you carry on through Salen and do that fearsome road [track?]to the Ardnamurchan lighthouse?
If so; how long did it take you and did you get out of first gear much?
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Did you carry on through Salen and do that fearsome road [track?]to the Ardnamurchan lighthouse?
If so; how long did it take you and did you get out of first gear much?
Did it last year......it's one helluva road isn't it. Can't remember how long it took, we were being tourists and were in convoy.
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>>>>>>Slightly off-thread but congratulations Stuart. Was this reported in any of the car magazines? Maybe you could post a link and some of us might sponsor you in retrospect.
If there's been a thread about this earlier, apologies for missing it.
Many Thanks Avant!!!
It was a great trip and we are currently at about £7500 raised for leukaemia research with money still coming in. It would be wonderful to receive even more funds for this wonderful cause. Donations can be made via
www.justgiving.com/LEJoGSEVENS
We were very very tired but jubilant at our fundraising!
Many thanks for your kind words!!
Kind Regards
Stuart Lathey
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So *that's* what all those Sevens were doing barrelling north along the A9 on Mon 20 Aug. I was driving my coach south from Strathpeffer back to the NW (see the speeding thread) and you guys passed me from round about 0930-1030 ish.
Two and a half days - blimey, have you managed to get a full range of movement back yet? Much respect to you all. Did you raise a good amount of cash?
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Good post woodbines i agree with your every word.
As rergards scottyland i was up there a few weeks back and loved every minute on the unclassified roads and B roads, in fact the only time i was on an A road was when i was crossing it .
I had not one problem i can recall, the other cars i met were all courtious the only problem was there were too many distileries to pass which can be a dammed nuisance especially if its a free one to try.
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Just remember bikes (well most) have no reverse gear and the ability to back up on a narrow lane depends on a lot of variables including rider skill, gradient, camber so be patient at times !
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Good post woodbines i agree with your every word.
But one good thing about numpties is that they congregate in towns, on motorways and at famous beauty spots (fortunately there are plenty of less famous ones)... I think a lot don't dare stray away from motorways once they are out of their home districts. Clogs up the motorways I agree, but you can't have everything.
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Hi Badwolf, glad we made our presence known!! Hope none of us cut you up!!! We are currently at about £7500 for leukaemia research and money is still coming in.
It was hard work but we raised a good sum of money for a great cause!
Donations can still be made via www.justgiving.com/LEJoGSEVENS
We ALL kept within the speed limits at all times, honestly officer
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PHIL W, Many thanks for your very generous donation!
Leukaemia Research are currently set to gain in excess of £7500 from this event!
Anyone who would like to donate can do so via
www.justgiving.com/LEJoGSEVENS
A very deserving cause.
Thank you so much,
Stuart
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twice we got deliberately held up by total carphounds (sorry Lud old twit doesn't even realise it's him committing the offence of 'driving without reasonable consideration for other road users' s3 RTA 1988 there i feel better now
Feel free Westpig, I'm flattered... those particular carphounds are a pet hate of mine too... so many about though that if there's much traffic on a single lane A road these days you may as well forget about making progress unless you have an RS4 or similar, and it's damn hard work even then I would think.
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"I long for the start of school term so all their scrunched up little faces & hideous hyperactive issue go back to thier Barrat boxes in the Midlands, where they can sit forever, stuck on the M6 outside the Ikea in Wednesbury. "
That has made my morning. Unlike some people on here who seem to get offended by "personal" references : ), that absolutely creased me up. And the reference to the aesthetic attributes of numpty's wife IS releveant, honestly it is!!!
Carry on amusing me please, don't let PC nonsense get in the way!
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I know where you are coming from. Having been born and grown up in the New Forest, I can't stand the drivers there (over and beyond there being too many people there). A blanket 40mph (max) has been put in place even where it is safe to do 60mph but I suppose that it is in the interests of not hitting wandering wildlife. But what gets me is when I overtake those that are doing 25-30mph so that I can carry on at 40mph, the headlights get flashed like I have run over 15 horses and left them dieing on the side of the road.
"i'll admit to being most unproffessional with my hand signals when he gave me a load of main beam......why oh why does it bother him what i'm up to?" - yup, I'm with you there 100%
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"Perhaps they're Welsh or Irish numpties, Scottish numpties out to irritate tourists like you, or foreign tourist numpties in hired cars?"
Irish numpties are easily spotted by the numberplates [there usually "D" for "Dublin" in the middle], and hire cars by the badge on the back window :-)
Look out for the incognito Hertz hire cars that have a round yellow badge with the number 1 rather than the company name...if driving 20mph below the limit and slowing down for every signpost doesn't give it away...
Personally, what I find even more annoying than the driving Westpig describes is the motorist that crawls along like a hedgehog caught in the headlights along regional roads, then suddenly becomes a fully paid up member of the road rage brigade as soon as he gets back into the familiar territory of a dual carriageway or motorway. Those cursed Dublin reg cars again :-)
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