Thursday, March 11, 2010

Left right

Arrived in a dry river bed north of Los Barilles in Baja California, Mexico.
To see friends who are staying there in their trailer.

About 40 other RV'ers are boondocking there also.
Some for months: it is for free.
They have build shacks and windscreens.
Use solar power and get water from town.
Their main activity is wind surfing.
And enjoying life.

Next to the arroyo is the Playa del Norte Trailer Park.
Where RV'ers can stay for $ 25 a night getting a decent and clean camping spot with electricity, water and a sewer connection.
This trailer park is hardly having any customers.

In most countries cars drive on the right side of the road.
Very convenient when you have to make a right turn.
In the United Kingdom though cars drive on the left side of the road.
Not to overtake another car like in most countries but permanently.
They all use the left lane for going somewhere.
Because they can't overtake on the next left lane, because there is no road there anymore, they overtake using the right lane.
This is when no other car comes their way.
But that is in most countries the same.
No overtaking takes place when another car is approaching.

In the nordic and Scandinavian country called Sweden they were also driving in the left lane.
All the cars all the time.
But they have changed that.
One day they told the drivers of the cars to move all to the right side and now they only use the left lane for overtaking.
This, also in Sweden, when no car is approaching.

The United Kingdom is not the only country in the world where cars drive in the left lane as if they were constantly overtaking.
But because all the cars do this nobody realizes they are in the wrong lane.

In the past the United Kingdom was a worldwide empire.
Because of their viciousness and imperialism they had colonies all over the world.
And the worst thing they did to those poor people living there was to tell them to drive on the left side of the road and to play cricket.
In the meantime the United Kingdom is far from an empire anymorem and their former colonies are now independent countries.
Although some of them still recognize the Queen of England as their head of state.
Grown up countries like Australia and Canada.
And they still play cricket and drive on the left side of the road that in fact is made to overtake another car.

But then we may wonder why there are countries that were never English colonies that nevertheless continue to make this mistake of driving in the wrong lane.
Take a country like Japan.
It is fair to say over there smart and clever people are living, right?
OK, they lost the war and this in a most painful way but to drive like the English?

The fervent and loyal blog readers are reminded that this is in a dry river bed north of Los Barilles in Baja California, Mexico.
Where a stop is made to see friends who are staying there in their trailer.
While about 40 other RV'ers are boondocking here.
A place producing a rather nonsense posting.







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5 comments:

Dawn Pier said...

For the record, Canadians neither play cricket, nor drive on the left hand side of the road. And we are seriously considering abandoning the Queen as our symbolic head of state. Why this hasn't already been done is beyond me - it would certainly make our fellow countrymen who are French descendants feel a little bit more welcome and maybe less likely to want to take their entire province and some of their neighbors' and secede (throwing our entire country into chaos and uncertainty once every decade or so).

Fred Wishnie said...

In Canada they drive on the right, not left.

Anonymous said...

34% of countries drive on the left.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-_and_left-hand_traffic

Anonymous said...

"lol @ "...and to play cricket." lol!"

Pete W.

Anonymous said...

": ) but the left-hand side is the right side, Michel!"
Sarah T.