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Pedestrian crossings!
Apr. 10th, 2014 06:30 pmThis week's lesson was today (well... yesterday by the time this actually gets posted) rather than the usual Tuesday as my instructor was up in London that day (at some book/author event, I think). Which was probably just as well, as I was definitely feeling a bit off back then and had somewhat lost my voice to whatever lurgy is currently doing the rounds. Anyway, I was feeling much better today!
Again I was in the driving seat for the entire lesson - gone are the days of the instructor driving me around! We started off by driving all the way from work along the A27, down past Fareham College and HMS Collingwood, before parking up somewhere in the depths of Gosport. And this time I managed it without stalling or attempting to ram any signposts (well... that bit when I almost stalled coming out of a junction doesn't count as I merely almost stalled).
( Pedestrian crossings! (warning: WALL OF TEXT) )
If that all looks like an enormous wall of text, that's because there's a lot of information to take in in these driving lessons! I think we spent the best part of an hour just going over all the different crossings and how to handle them. Anyway, after that it was time for a tour of Gosport naming the different crossing types are they appeared ("Puffin... Pelican... Pelican... Toucan... trick question, that's just some traffic lights") before heading back up to Fareham along Newgate Lane. Oh, and dealing with plenty of roundabouts and a few crossings in the process, and getting slightly flustered trying to manage mirror/signal/manoeuvre/gear all at the same time. Back outside my flat my instructor gave me a tip on how to handle this - the time to signal for your exit is not so much as you pass the exit before, but a little later when you're pointing straight at your exit. Doing so then is a little easier as there's less stuff happening at the moment.
Next week: how to cope with oncoming traffic!
Again I was in the driving seat for the entire lesson - gone are the days of the instructor driving me around! We started off by driving all the way from work along the A27, down past Fareham College and HMS Collingwood, before parking up somewhere in the depths of Gosport. And this time I managed it without stalling or attempting to ram any signposts (well... that bit when I almost stalled coming out of a junction doesn't count as I merely almost stalled).
( Pedestrian crossings! (warning: WALL OF TEXT) )
If that all looks like an enormous wall of text, that's because there's a lot of information to take in in these driving lessons! I think we spent the best part of an hour just going over all the different crossings and how to handle them. Anyway, after that it was time for a tour of Gosport naming the different crossing types are they appeared ("Puffin... Pelican... Pelican... Toucan... trick question, that's just some traffic lights") before heading back up to Fareham along Newgate Lane. Oh, and dealing with plenty of roundabouts and a few crossings in the process, and getting slightly flustered trying to manage mirror/signal/manoeuvre/gear all at the same time. Back outside my flat my instructor gave me a tip on how to handle this - the time to signal for your exit is not so much as you pass the exit before, but a little later when you're pointing straight at your exit. Doing so then is a little easier as there's less stuff happening at the moment.
Next week: how to cope with oncoming traffic!
