To drive in Scotland: reality I
It was easy to make a plan for driving around in Scotland during about two weeks, but quite a different thing to drive in practice.
I had rented a car more than a month in advance in order to be sure to have the kind of car I wanted I had chosen Sixt based on the fact that the Finnish Automobile Association had a rebate code for the company.
When I came to pick up the car, the Edinburgh City branch had no suitable car. My contact said that I would get a Volkswagen Golf, Seat Ibiza or the like. They had reserved a Mercedes CLS 350 D, a huge care in every respect: wide and long. There was no paper handbook "because people steal them", but instead an electronic one. The lady from the company sat behind the steering wheel in a dark garage and showed me the main points so that I could start. It was very dark so I could not see the details. It was very difficult to get a picture of the cars dimensions. The lady was pressed to take care of the next customer, so she never walked around the car with me.
I started driving through the City Center of Edinburgh. When the speed limit changed to 40 mph, I realized that the car does not react to me pressing the gas pedal! I quickly realized that I have to pull in on a side road. Unfortunately the road soon ended at a Renal Unit of some hospital! There was a sign: only ambulances beyond this point, but there was no place to turn before the signpost! A man asked me if I was OK. When I said that I was OK, he said that I could drive slightly further in order to turn. I could not, however, return to the big road, so I turned left only to find myself on the road to the Maternity Unit! The navigator asked me to turn right in 200 yards. I did not remember how much a yard is, but had no Internet connection, so I wanted to ask someone. I pulled into the left kerb as I could see cars standing there. It turned out to be a taxi stand. A taxi driver approached me sayingn that I could not park there. One of them, however, told me that a yard is about one meter. I then returned to the big road and happily soon found a second small street to drive into. There I parked and was able to read the handbook on the monitor. It turned out that someone had put a limit of 25-30 mph on!!! That could have been fatal if I had driven out on a motorway!
Finally I got going!
(to be continued)
I had rented a car more than a month in advance in order to be sure to have the kind of car I wanted I had chosen Sixt based on the fact that the Finnish Automobile Association had a rebate code for the company.
When I came to pick up the car, the Edinburgh City branch had no suitable car. My contact said that I would get a Volkswagen Golf, Seat Ibiza or the like. They had reserved a Mercedes CLS 350 D, a huge care in every respect: wide and long. There was no paper handbook "because people steal them", but instead an electronic one. The lady from the company sat behind the steering wheel in a dark garage and showed me the main points so that I could start. It was very dark so I could not see the details. It was very difficult to get a picture of the cars dimensions. The lady was pressed to take care of the next customer, so she never walked around the car with me.
I started driving through the City Center of Edinburgh. When the speed limit changed to 40 mph, I realized that the car does not react to me pressing the gas pedal! I quickly realized that I have to pull in on a side road. Unfortunately the road soon ended at a Renal Unit of some hospital! There was a sign: only ambulances beyond this point, but there was no place to turn before the signpost! A man asked me if I was OK. When I said that I was OK, he said that I could drive slightly further in order to turn. I could not, however, return to the big road, so I turned left only to find myself on the road to the Maternity Unit! The navigator asked me to turn right in 200 yards. I did not remember how much a yard is, but had no Internet connection, so I wanted to ask someone. I pulled into the left kerb as I could see cars standing there. It turned out to be a taxi stand. A taxi driver approached me sayingn that I could not park there. One of them, however, told me that a yard is about one meter. I then returned to the big road and happily soon found a second small street to drive into. There I parked and was able to read the handbook on the monitor. It turned out that someone had put a limit of 25-30 mph on!!! That could have been fatal if I had driven out on a motorway!
Finally I got going!
(to be continued)
upplagd av Helena
00:38
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