Driving in Sydney this week for a car launch, my Aussie passenger (and fellow motoring writer) made a complaint that I thought was a New Zealand-only issue.
As we headed along the busy motorway into Sydney after spending a few hours in the nearby Hunter Valley, my passenger looked at a car toddling in the fast lane and shook his head.
“Sydneysiders just don’t know that actually the left-hand lane is the one to be in, not sit below the speed limit in the overtaking lane,” he moaned.
Yes, it seems the lane hogger is an Australasian issue rather than one we commuters face on a daily basis on New Zealand roads.
How often do you come across someone sitting the “fast” lane — doing just under 100km/h — for kilometres on end? They obviously haven’t looked in their rear view mirror since they started the engine because they would see a line of cars behind them.
Other fast lane hoggers have the mindset of “I’m doing the speed limit so no one else should be going faster than me” and stubbornly refuse to move lane.
Or in the case of my mother, she needs to be in the right lane to join her off-ramp on Auckland’s motorway system so she decides to sit in the “fast” lane (doing 80km/h) for about 10 minutes — just to make sure she doesn’t miss her connection.
Bless her.
My daughter was a passenger in Grandma’s car last week and reported back to me that another driver had enough of the slow speed and tooted the horn at my mum. Sorry but that didn’t work.
Don’t worry, Mr Tooter, I’ll explain to her the road rules.