Beware of road hazards

There's quite a few signs on the roads here that leave me a little bemused. One we saw frequently in Oman, for example, said 'stop if the water is at red'. Just after the signs the road dipped a bit and there were red poles along the length of the dip. We discussed this and made the assumption that at some times in the year, the roads must flood at those points. Given these roads were going through the rocky, desolate mountains I could see some logic in this. Perhaps there are heavy downfalls at certain times of the year. When the signs and dips continued through the desert, I was a bit confused. We shall have to wait and see what happens when it rains I suppose, it's been a long while since it has.

The sign 'beware of road hazards' in big letters on a big sign board is easier to understand, so I thought. I'd heard stories of people hitting things, in one case a bumper bar that had detached itself from a car, on the motorway and damaging their cars. I would certainly keep a lookout for those things on the long drive to Abu Dhabi. How hard can it be to see/avoid hazards on such a straight road, a mostly three lane straight road?

I was soon educated about the real road hazards, Nissan Patrols and other assorted 4WDs. I was tootling along in the 120kph zone at about 130kph, beeper that beeps when I go over 120 drowned out by a bit of Metallica when I happened to glance in my rear view mirrors. Knowing where the other traffic is is recommended in most countries but is particularly important here.

In my side mirror on one side I saw a fast approaching 4WD. No worries I thought. There were a couple of cars well in front of me and a lane each side of me free. Then I looked in the other mirror, oh no whats that? A rocket ship flying up on the inside. The two caught up as they reached me and crossed lanes in front of me, travelling very, very fast. Then they met the two cars in front, oh no only one lane and two 4WDs. No worries, before the cars could take evasive action the two took the same lane dicing and dodging, narrowly missing the armco and kicking up a trail of dust and stones behind them. Wow, it was close and very scary, now I truly understand the meaning of that sign.

The best was yet to come. About 2kms down the road was an Adnoc service station and you guessed it, they both pulled in. Oh no, did I have to go through that again, yes of course only this time they skipped all except speeding past so fast my car shook, a feeling I got used to on my drive as others sped past too. There are speed cameras, I saw one flash. I hope it wasn't for me.

Speaking of speed cameras, another sign said 100kph. The sign below it said 'road controlled by radar. Radar set at 120kph'. I have been told that the radar tolerances are around 20kph over the limit. I do wonder about the point of having a limit and the radar set so far above it. Oh well, mine is not to question why, just to drive a little over the speed limit and hope that's true. We shall see. A friend told me that I'd manage two weeks without a ticket, it's been three now. Best I check the ticket website.......

More about the AD trip soon and some photos.