Driving in far North Queensland

For those planning a holiday in Far North Queensland I thought I better post some road rules. The rules for driving here are very simple, but very different from anywhere else on the planet. You might think drivers where you live are bad, but we here in FNQ can give you a run for your money.

The rules are,

1. The biggest vehicle has right of way, always. If you have the biggest vehicle just get in a go where you want. Do not stop at traffic lights, roundabouts or to let old ladies cross the road, just go from A to B at whatever speed you choose.

2. The smaller vehicles must try and get in front of the biggest vehicles, if they're lucky they will do this with only minimal paint swapping activities.

3. Never look in your rear view or wing mirrors. The people behind you are behind you, why do you care where they are? Wing mirrors are parking aids in much the same way that a cat's whiskers operate (touch) and the rear view mirror is for putting on make up and checking for stray bits of food in your teeth.

4. Hang something shiny off the rear view mirror. In our sunny climate crystals work really well. If by chance some foreigner glances in their rear view mirror you stand a good chance of blinding them leading to less damn foreigners that don't know the road rules being on the road.

5. In other parts of the world the three second rule refers to the gap you leave between you and the vehicle in front. In FNQ we have the one second rule. This is the gap that you pull into when changing lanes (don't indicate). If there is any chance of leaving a gap larger than one second between you and the car in front you must accelerate and catch the car in front.(A simple way to test this is to see if you can see the whites of the driver in front's eyes in their rear view mirror. You should be able to at all times.)

6. You can pull straight out into a moving lane of traffic if you indicate (not necessarily in the direction you wish to go, just indicate.)

7. Never indicate unless you are going to leave the indicator on for at least six miles.

8. The younger you are the faster you must go. If you are under twenty at no time should you be travelling at less than thirty mph above the speed limit.

9. If you are towing a caravan, house or bridge (we get a lot of the last two) then always travel between eight and nine in the morning and between two-thirty and five thirty in the afternoon. (The video below is a house Homer caught crossing onto a main road at 6.30 am in the morning, just starting its journey to the town centre in time for the rush hour, you can just see the house on the left. It was taken with mobile phone at 6:30am so cut him a break on the quality.)


10. Make sure your headlights are adjusted to shine directly into the car in front's rear mirror. It is preferable to drive at all times on full beam, with fog lamps. (I know we don't get fog up here but you must swallow your pride and have them on, all the time.)

(P.S. We have roundabouts up here, but don't be fooled, we don't use them the same way as the rest of the world. See rule 1 and rules 6 and 7.)