My first experience driving in Europe was renting a car from Naples Airport to City Center and then on to Gaeta. At night. HOLY HELL! Why are you honking at me? The light is clearly red up there!

Then I moved to the UK.

It all seems so easy now...

Reminds me of this

Naples is the worst. Grannies on vespas, the speed of light.

I thoroughly enjoyed that mini rant on the misunderstandings of driving here. It is possible to drive for fun here, you just need to know where to go and expect to meet other cars at all times.
There's a certain element of fun in giving a scare to people from countries with wide roads and plenty of view and bringing them on a spin up a pass. Or better again, a spin down a country road in Ireland where the hedges block all possible visibility and there's clearance for about 2.01 cars to pass.

The roundabouts here are a breeze, the Arc de Triumph has been mentioned, but my last experience of gritted teeth driving was in Barcelona involving what could have been roundabouts, might have been circular roads and were very possibly just circular areas of pavement with no markings and multiple exits. Add traffic lights to taste.

But I will agree that the lack of indicators on roundabouts is a frustration here, I hate myself every time I push the stalk for a 3 blink to exit the roundabout only to notice I've not pushed far enough, I have become the very thing I hate.

Read it again - BB2 clearly meant it as anything other than acceptable behaviour.

60 is perhaps slightly exaggerated. But I find 80 or so to be horribly common on joining.

The name "Anne Sa cool ass" springs to mind.....

"They" is thalcave not BB2.

Unfortunately 60 km/h is not that exaggerated when you see trucks hitting the break.

It took the post as irony.

BTW every slip in lane has an upside down triangle sign, meaning the one joining should give way...

afraid in glarus joining / leaving at 60 isn't exaggerated

When it was built I was living with my parents in the County Ground Hotel pub, within a couple of hundred metres from said roundabout. We would hear countless horns and crunches but people soon learnt and as said it is very fluid, as long as everyone knows what they are doing. As well as being able to go around the outside using each individual roundabout, you can go straight over, a bit scary the first time!

I had one of those in front of me last week. It was VERY strange
I was seriously wondering how he would deal with joining the traffic on the highway. Luckily I knew I didn't have to change lanes as the one I would automatically be on would take me off direction Schaffhausen.

Left hand roundabouts are the worst!

Okay, nope, those roads are. Kent is full of them. I have no clue how I survived them without a scratch. Nor a ripped off side-mirror.
Lots of wasted adrenalin, that's for sure.

Trivia question is this the only roundabout in the UK you can traverse in the "wrong direction"

I've driven it a few times it's fun

It's not though. There's one at the end of Colne Causeway in Colchester - 5 mini roundabouts in a circle. When I learned to drive it was one big one called Greenstead Roundabout

An American complaining about driving in Switzerland? That's a good one.

Yielding to pedestrians on pedestrian crossings exists in the USA too. The things is that nobody cares. In recent years, in many towns here in Michigan the local authorities have armed all pedestrian crossings with forests of signs, to absolutely no avail. As a pedestrian at a a crossing without lights you still are free game.

Yielding to right in situations where no other kind of regulation applies is a thing in the USA too. Again, just nobody cares. When I showed the relevant passages to my (American) wife after her having driven cars in the USA for more than 40 years, her jaw dropped to her chest.

Because nobody knows about the yield-to-right rule, practically every crossing or T-junction has to be peppered with Stop signs. That's why, for instance, Traverse City, MI (about 15,000 inhabitants) sure like heck has way more Stop signs than the entire metropolitan area of Zurich. And don't get me going on the ridiculous nuisance called four-way stop crossings, not to mention the fact that no American - I repeat: no American - ever really stops at a Stop sign, unless they have to because there's another vehicle forcing them to do so.

Granted, traffic lights are placed somewhat differently in various countries, but does anybody really think the US system makes any more sense? It took me quite a while to figure certain things out.

Lest I forget, does the OP think it makes any sense that the basic traffic rules are different in the USA depending on where you are, see left turn on red and suchlike.

Brett, thanks for your extensive essay, welcome to the EF, Switzerland and the fact that some things are not American outside of the USA. Now please use the search function for brown sugar and bread that can be kept four months without getting moldy, sometimes called "real bread" by noobs. (Hint: bread in bakeries is not stale; that's called "crust".)

__________________

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The traffic lights hung high above - on the other side of the crossing in the US, I remember. So I always did stop in front of the read light - basically on the crossing. Which immediately made me move on of course.
My guardian angel must have worked over-time back then as I never got into an accident nor did the police ever see/fine me. (Or maybe what must have looked like extremely strange behaviour simply flabbergasted them? ) It was a long time ago when things were a lot more relaxed.

I always found drivers in Switzerland were in their own little world when driving thinking they were bomb proof in their tin boxes, probably why our neighbours repair shop was always full of crash repairs.

Anyways not sure why this works. When I moved to California I was unable to just swap licenses. One has to retake the full drivers exam, written and behind the wheel test.

I liked this one the best!

Welcome to the forum and to Switzerland, OP! Try to keep your sense of humour up, you're gonna need it!

Clearly, most of you missed the tongue in cheek nature of this article. I do quite well driving in Switzerland. The point was to look at the nuances and differences in a fun way. But thank you for each of you who have shared your thoughts on what I should do with my license. It does make for some fun reading on my part.

I think, perhaps, your tongue should have been a little more firmly in cheek... And, as someone suggested, probably avoid driving in the UK. Many traps for the unwary.