Riding to Wokingham this morning I heard this enormous gnashing of gears behind me. It was a billion tonne Terranova Crane slowing as my primary positioning left him little legal choice. He wouldn't ever have got past me with that thing even if I'd ridden in the gutter.
I pulled off into a drive a hundred metres later and got a very cheery 'thank you' from the left-hand-driver.
This put me in such a good frame of mind that I repeated it for a skip-truck a few kilometers further along - and got a wave!
Riding to Wokingham this morning I heard this enormous gnashing of gears behind me. It was a billion tonne Terranova Crane slowing as my primary positioning left him little legal choice. He wouldn't ever have got past me with that thing even if I'd ridden in the gutter.
I pulled off into a drive a hundred metres later and got a very cheery 'thank you' from the left-hand-driver.
This put me in such a good frame of mind that I repeated it for a skip-truck a few kilometers further along - and got a wave!
Perhaps they're human after all.
R.
There's quite a few HGVs in my neck of the woods, due to a quarry being nearby, plus all the crops being harvested and various rural industrial estates. I find HGV drivers to usually be extremely courteous, much more so than car drivers or White Van Man [TM]. Worst of all are BMW & 4-wheel drive things, who love to bomb along narrow country lanes imagining they are doing a stage of the RAC Rally on their own personal rally track :-( I've had an HGV driver hold up the traffic on a busy main road to allow little me on my bicycle safe passage across said road. Lovely man!
Cheers, helen s
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On Wed, 15 Sep 2004 12:55:03 GMT, The Oldfellow <[email hidden]> wrote: [...]
Quoted message said:
I pulled off into a drive a hundred metres later and got a very cheery 'thank you' from the left-hand-driver.
This put me in such a good frame of mind that I repeated it for a skip-truck a few kilometers further along - and got a wave!
Perhaps they're human after all.
Yes, they are. My dad was one until he retired and he's definitely human. Lorries can have real problems overtaking and I try to pull in and let them past when it's safe to do so. On one occasion last year I pulled into the entrance to a farm to let a truck pass me---having first looked back to check he wasn't indicating to pull into that farm! What I didn't realise was that just around the bend the road dropped and wound so much that the lorry was slower than I would have been on the descent. Still, the driver pipped his thanks when he'd overtaken and gave me a second wave when we'd both got to the bottom of the hill----I like to think he was acknowledging the sacrifice I'd made in arriving at the pub almost 30 seconds later than I would have otherwise :-)
"dirtylitterboxofferingstospammers" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
Quoted message said:
There's quite a few HGVs in my neck of the woods, due to a quarry being nearby, plus all the crops being harvested and various rural industrial estates. I find HGV drivers to usually be extremely courteous, much more so than car drivers or White Van Man [TM].
I agree. I ride to work along a very busy docks road and nearly all of the HGV drivers move over into the overtaking lane to pass, whereas the WV drivers almost take your head off with their door mirrors.
In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden] says...
Quoted message said:
Riding to Wokingham this morning I heard this enormous gnashing of gears behind me. It was a billion tonne Terranova Crane slowing as my primary positioning left him little legal choice. He wouldn't ever have got past me with that thing even if I'd ridden in the gutter.
I pulled off into a drive a hundred metres later and got a very cheery 'thank you' from the left-hand-driver.
This put me in such a good frame of mind that I repeated it for a skip-truck a few kilometers further along - and got a wave!
Perhaps they're human after all.
There is a great deal more work to be done in driving very large vehicles and the drivers who do so tend to be better than their more casual counterparts. There are exceptions on both sides but I've never had any real grief from lorries.
"Jon Senior" <jon@restlesslemon_DOT_co_DOT_uk.remove> wrote in message news:[email hidden]...
Quoted message said:
There is a great deal more work to be done in driving very large vehicles and the drivers who do so tend to be better than their more casual counterparts. There are exceptions on both sides but I've never had any real grief from lorries.
The HGV tests are far more rigourous than the basic driving test.
Riding to Wokingham this morning I heard this enormous gnashing of gears behind me. It was a billion tonne Terranova Crane slowing as my primary positioning left him little legal choice. He wouldn't ever have got past me with that thing even if I'd ridden in the gutter.
I pulled off into a drive a hundred metres later and got a very cheery 'thank you' from the left-hand-driver.
This put me in such a good frame of mind that I repeated it for a skip-truck a few kilometers further along - and got a wave!
Perhaps they're human after all.
R.
In my experience lorry drivers tend to be the most cycle friendly people on the road.
In article <[email hidden]>, The Oldfellow says...
Quoted message said:
Riding to Wokingham this morning I heard this enormous gnashing of gears behind me. It was a billion tonne Terranova Crane slowing as my primary positioning left him little legal choice. He wouldn't ever have got past me with that thing even if I'd ridden in the gutter.
I pulled off into a drive a hundred metres later and got a very cheery 'thank you' from the left-hand-driver.
This put me in such a good frame of mind that I repeated it for a skip-truck a few kilometers further along - and got a wave!
Perhaps they're human after all.
I've always found tractor and truck drivers to be really patient while I'm tootling around Herefordshire. It's the muppets in minibuses that really get on my nerves, particularly the [censored] in the knackered old "JMC" labelled thing that nearly took me out at Symonds Yat a couple of weeks ago. If it wasn't for those pesky knobbly tyres I'd have caught him, too.
Last week, while out with a friend and his Lumicycle "brighter than the desert sun" lights a bloke in a BMW almost got his car stuck in the hedge when he saw us coming at him on a country lane. I imagine he thought we were far bigger than we actually are!
"Jon Senior" <jon@restlesslemon_DOT_co_DOT_uk.remove> wrote in message news:[email hidden]...
Quoted message said:
In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden] says...
Quoted message said:
Riding to Wokingham this morning I heard this enormous gnashing of gears behind me. It was a billion tonne Terranova Crane slowing as my primary positioning left him little legal choice. He wouldn't ever have got past me with that thing even if I'd ridden in the gutter.
I pulled off into a drive a hundred metres later and got a very cheery 'thank you' from the left-hand-driver.
This put me in such a good frame of mind that I repeated it for a skip-truck a few kilometers further along - and got a wave!
Perhaps they're human after all.
There is a great deal more work to be done in driving very large vehicles and the drivers who do so tend to be better than their more casual counterparts. There are exceptions on both sides but I've never had any real grief from lorries.
Jon
HGV drivers do tend to be excellent. Shame the same isn't true about bus drivers (around London, at least) who seem about as skilled/knowledgable/polite as WVM, but with considerably more killing power.
"The Oldfellow" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:[email hidden]...
Quoted message said:
Riding to Wokingham this morning I heard this enormous gnashing of gears behind me. It was a billion tonne Terranova Crane slowing as my primary positioning left him little legal choice. He wouldn't ever have got past me with that thing even if I'd ridden in the gutter.
I pulled off into a drive a hundred metres later and got a very cheery 'thank you' from the left-hand-driver.
This put me in such a good frame of mind that I repeated it for a skip-truck a few kilometers further along - and got a wave!
Perhaps they're human after all.
Lorry drivers are generally more considerate and predictable than car drivers IME. Due to their size and lack of real acceleration I often pull over for them. Yesterday when driving a lorry pulled into a lay-by on a hill to let the 4 or 5 of us stuck behind him to pass, not the kind of behaviour shown by a lot of doddery gits who are oblivious to all around so absorbed are they by counting cats eyes.
Matthew Myatt [email hidden] opined the following...
Quoted message said:
HGV drivers do tend to be excellent. Shame the same isn't true about bus drivers (around London, at least) who seem about as skilled/knowledgable/polite as WVM, but with considerably more killing power.
Funnily enough I was pondering exactly this on my way home (See my rant elsewhere!).
Riding to Wokingham this morning I heard this enormous gnashing of gears behind me. It was a billion tonne Terranova Crane slowing as my primary positioning left him little legal choice. He wouldn't ever have got past me with that thing even if I'd ridden in the gutter.
I pulled off into a drive a hundred metres later and got a very cheery 'thank you' from the left-hand-driver.
Whenever I've pulled off to allow a lorry to go past (generally where over-taking would be impossible, and following me at 10mph intolerable) I've got a cheery wave.
Last week, while out with a friend and his Lumicycle "brighter than the desert sun" lights a bloke in a BMW almost got his car stuck in the hedge when he saw us coming at him on a country lane. I imagine he thought we were far bigger than we actually are!
The nights drawing in somewhat, Juliette and I have been going for our constitutional on our hill bikes with our big lights on. Generally we've been coming home on the shore road which is 'single track road with passing places'. We've been amused by the number of cars which have dipped their lights and pulled off into the passing places to wait for us to come past...
In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden] says...
Quoted message said:
in message <[email hidden]>, Hywel
(') said:
Last week, while out with a friend and his Lumicycle "brighter than the desert sun" lights a bloke in a BMW almost got his car stuck in the hedge when he saw us coming at him on a country lane. I imagine he thought we were far bigger than we actually are!
The nights drawing in somewhat, Juliette and I have been going for our constitutional on our hill bikes with our big lights on. Generally we've been coming home on the shore road which is 'single track road with passing places'. We've been amused by the number of cars which have dipped their lights and pulled off into the passing places to wait for us to come past...
.... and unamused by the one who switched his lights back up and pulled out in front of me when he spotted that I was a cyclist. Still, it was nice to be able to flash my lights at him.
The nights drawing in somewhat, Juliette and I have been going for our constitutional on our hill bikes with our big lights on. Generally we've been coming home on the shore road which is 'single track road with passing places'. We've been amused by the number of cars which have dipped their lights and pulled off into the passing places to wait for us to come past...
I was pleasantly surprised at how many motorists in Scotland pulled into passing places to let me pass on my bicycle, in broad daylight with no headlights on my bike to make them think I was a car. Of course they may just have wanted to get a look at all my touring gear, especially when I was slogging up a 20% grade! -- mark
