Question for those who drive on the wrong side of the road....

[Cal Price]

Well they just hopped over the international date line to get in step with Australia, NZ and Japan which is where they see their destiny. I suppose it makes sense.

[mister]

And a bizarre thing is that Samoa, which changed driving sides a couple of years back, went from driving on the right to driving on the left!!!!!  Story is that they wanted to import cheap cars from Japan and NZ and Aus...don't know if that's true.

I'd believe: teach all their people to drive on the left so they won't have a problem when they come to Australia to live.

[simon79]

Hallo all - just come back from my first (and first-hand) experience 'on the wrong side' - namely Malta.
We'd only stay there a few days so we decided to hire a car - which of course was RHD being Malta one of the few LHT EU countries.
Personally I found next to no problems, as someone else said here, driving a vehicle with the steering wheel on the 'proper' side helps a lot, it comes second nature to keep the kerb where it should be. Traffic helps, too - you just blend in. Even shifting gears with the other hand wasn't a problem.
Just be aware at intersections, roundabouts and when making a turn across the road. Always keep an eye at your mirrors.

I'm glad I did - driving a RHD car was something I'd long wanted to do just to feel what it was like.

As for driving around in Malta itself - the locals drive quite happily, I expected worse but came out OK. But then again I've also seen traffic like that - or worse - here in Italy, so I was not surprised much.
What put me off a bit instead was road lighting and signalling - both often poor or nonexistant. Luckily there were lots of roundabouts otherwise it would've been quite a nightmare. A satnav or a good map AND a patient passenger are very welcome.
Road paving also leaves a lot to be desired especially outside La Valletta. The upside of this is no one can really drive fast - max speed limit I've seen is 80 kph (50 mph) even out of town. Speed cameras also help.

[Cal Price]

I've spent quite a lot of time in Malta, my late wife and I were planning to move there permanently before her illness. Some of the road surfaces are indeed a bit dodgy, they have a system whereby claimants of unemployment benefits have to do public work (at least they did in the 90s and probably still do) this led to so rather iffy standards of repair, after all they need to get done quickly so they could get back to the unofficial evening job at the hotel or bar or whatever!

There seems to be a build up of a sort of petroleum sheen on a lot of surfaces, probably caused by the lack of rain to shift it which can be a bit slippery. Having said all that some of the footpaths are worse and the drain covers bite the ladies high-heels. Despite all that you gotta love the place. Like I said earlier DRIVE IN THE SHADE!