How about...worst experience...driving down the motorway behind a truck with gas bottles, and one falls off the truck and bounces along the road towards you...what saves you? just a lucky bounce that sends it off track onto the verge.

I was shaking!!!!

Sh*t ... I would have had a coronary!

Reminds me of a time we were driving up SH1 near Timaru going at 100k+ with oncoming traffic doing the same. Going around a slight corner and this wheel is rolling down the road towards us, very quickly and bouncing a bit like you sometimes see in grand prix accidents. Not sure if it was luck or a bit of nifty driving on my part, but we managed to avoid it, and in my rear mirror I saw it roll into a field.

To this day, I have no idea if it was somebody's spare wheel, or if some bloke pulls in later at a service station and wonders why everyone is staring with mouths open at his nearside.

Sometimes have to wonder if there is someone/something watching over and saying "not yet"

I thought all mums (UK and NZ) had 4wds to drop their kids off at school?

They do round here .... all funded through drugs though I have a little Micra, my new baby, but as eldest' school is one street behind my house and he's 9, he walks with his mates lol.

Michelle xx

I was driving behind a guy in a battered old car in the rain, and every now and again he reached out of the window and manually moved the drivers side wiper to clear the window

Brilliant

We almost got killed in a head on collision on our reccie trip!

We were driving up SH1 north of Waikanae, single lane on our side of the road, lane + passing lane on the oncoming traffic side. All of a sudden some numpty pulls out of the passing lane across the double yellow lines to overtake the guy in front of him right in front of us!!! I had to do a vicious swerve for him to miss us and then control 4 or 5 fishtails of our car before getting the car under control again!!

It REALLY scared the sh1t out of me & Clare and I was a wreck the rest of the day - it was a damn close call! I was a well nervous driver for a few days after that one!

Dave

OMG Dave ,that must have been scary! I'm a very nervous passenger- terrible back seat driver, so it looks as if I'm going to have to drive or wear a blindfold
Do those crazy drivers risk assess? - or do they just assume the other drivers will get out of their way!
It's freaking me out!

This is old news - I remember when we were visiting NZ for the first time in '97, a couple of days beforehand The Straits times reported that a Singaporean couple on their honeymoon in NZ were killed whilst driving. What a combination Singaporeans and NZers both overtaking from opposite directions and smash!
I was a wreck then too!

Bloody hell Dave, that's awful! I'm so relieved you're all OK. xxx

Cheers hun!
xx

I see bad driving constantly when I'm out in my little car - it's a Suzuki Alto and has a 700cc engine. This does not stop it from doing 50 in a 50 zone however, but other drivers (notably Toyota Surfs, something to prove, I'm sure), like to accellerate past me... why? I'm doing the limit already!!

Because this little car is so little, when on the motorway, it's top comfortable speed is 80km. It can do 100km, but it's not too happy So, I make sure I'm in the far left lane when doing this speed on a motorway. S'fine right? Slow speed, move to the left, that's the rule, yeah? Well, one time a really stressed out MALE is behind me, flashing his lights and getting really, really agitated. Where should I go? The hard shoulder? He refused to pass me via the two lanes on the right for about 5km and finally decided that he could use the other lanes to pass me...

.....yep
The way I see it having been driving in NZ for 2 months and having already witnessed 2 smashes plus loads of reckless driving in/around Auckland, there are several factors here (ie Auckland ares) all making it pretty unsafe on/around the roads:
no insurance requirement (and so no need to worry about no-claims, and no prohibition in terms of cost on young/risky drivers getting into fast/powerful cars, etc)
no test (for some older drivers who qualified on time held for provisional licence)
low driving age
low concern for risk on the part of Kiwis
lots of immigrants with "variable" driving ability
poor maintenance of vehicles

all mean that the carnage (and that is what most Kiwis realise it is) will continue on the roads until someone changes at least one of these factors....

gawd help us, the padestrians and our kids

A lot of the driving is unbelievable isn't it?
I hate people driving right up your @rse. Overtaking on a blind corner.
I was driving through a level crossing that turns on to a fairly sharp corner. Some eejit overtook the car in front of me on the level crossing and into the blind corner. Just sheer luck nothing was coming the other way. Madness.
Or another pet hate. Driving along at 100ks come to a overtaking lane, guy behind zooms past at 140ks then slows right back to 100. Eh?