Driving

"The N. American driving experience leaves you woefully unprepared for driving in Britain or Ireland."

So are you considering driving in the United Kingdom or Ireland, or perhaps you have already reserved a car with one of the rental companies? The above quote is exaggerated or prejudiced, right? Unfortunately, I am afraid it is only too true. If you haven’t driven in the Islands before, you could be in for a rapid and perhaps stressful learning experience. If you doubt what I’m saying, find someone who has done it and ask for their reaction. Part of it is the effort needed to combat years of conditioning in order to drive “on the wrong side”, but there is much, much more: different driving conventions; unknown road signs; large multi-lane roundabouts; a two-thousand-year old road structure that is often narrow and steep; etc. etc.. And capping it all is the background fear that you’ll make a serious mistake. Now throw in jet lag, and you have a bit of a devil’s brew. In short, driving in North America simply does not prepare you adequately for this!

Fortunately, you can now prepare before you leave home!

It used to be that you were mostly on your own with this problem. True, the car rental company might have a saccharine little web page, and then hand you a small leaflet with a few road signs on it when you arrived, but that was about it. No longer! Reacting to an Irish policeman’s comment, I realized I had the qualifications and training to analyze the difficulties and offer solutions, as well as having plenty of writing experience behind me. The result is the book On the Wrong Side! However, and I stress this, it will only help you if you read it well before you leave home, as it has explanations, exercises and vital things to remember.

By the way, the road signs and mini-roundabout illustration above are all taken directly from various pages of the book.