Wide roads, easy access coastal sites
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Mama Shell - I would suggest finding an easy access site near home or the dealership you buy the LV from so if needed any issues can be addressed easily. Also don’t always rely on SatNav – have a road atlas to check out the route before setting off and as others have said read any directions in the book or on website.
Don’t really know sites in Cheshire though have stayed at Southport which we found OK and an affiliated site Royal Vale which we wouldn’t return to but it suited our purpose at the time. Carnon Downs site near Truro, Cornwall may be one to check out for the future though we haven’t stayed there only looked around it some years back. Reading reviews of sites may be helpful. Good luck.
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Best advice is - practise, practise and more practise. Practise gives you the ability and the confidence. As someone above mentioned an industrial estate on a weekend will be near empty, so the roads can be used almost free of traffic, to develop your manoeuvring skills. You need to learn to reverse and keep the outfit going back straight and to reverse into a side road.
On the road, you also need to learn to look much further ahead and plan further ahead, than when driving solo.
On Anglesey I came nose to nose with a small car and elderly driver, on a very narrow road. The nearest passing place was just a few yards behind him, but he simply couldn't work out how to reverse into it. Instead I had to reverse a quarter mile with the caravan to let him past.
On another occasion and on a slope, with a blocked road, I had to turn the outfit around, with no space to do it. The only way was to uncouple, spin the caravan round in the road using chocks plus handbrake, turn the car round and recouple up facing the other way. I still carry wheel chocks just in case, but have a mover so it would be much easier now.
On a large near empty field site with a slope up to get out, with a FWD tow car, it had rained and the grass was slippy. I couldn't get enough grip to pull the outfit up the slope. Instead I went up in a series of zig-zags, making tight turns at each end. The tight turns, reduced the torque needed on my front wheel tyres. That site has since had a gravel track laid, making it easy in the wet.
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It’s not always just caravan towing drivers that need to learn to reverse on tiny roads. Our friend, who lives in a neighbouring village, was in his front garden tidying, it’s a small road outside his cottage. Lone car coming one way, very smart car he said, lady driver and passenger, single decker bus, cars behind and a delivery van going the other way. Lady driver point blankly refused to back up, said she couldn’t. Eventually the bus driver got out and informed her that it was a long way to a passing place behind him, all the traffic couldn’t back up and if she didn’t move they could be there all day. Our friend offered to try to guide her but she still went into the hedge a few times and became more distraught. How do these people pass their tests and if they know they can’t do it why don’t they practice?
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How do these people pass their tests……?
Good question, I’ve often wondered.
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Reversing a longish way actually isn't in the driving test, and I believe reversing round a corner has gone so has three point turns, although reverse parallel and bay parking is.
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Any form of going backwards would be good…… understanding dimensions of car would be useful too.I meet them in narrow lanes on a regular basis and you can see the terror in their eyes and subsequent relief when I back up to let them through. Recently a young driver in the lane alongside my house (narrow & high banks) managed to turn her car over by continuing to drive forward up the bank rather than face the horrors of reversing!
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I have some sympathy with the elderly who struggle to reverse, they are maybe out of practise, but no excuse for the young not to be able to do it. I'm edging into the elderly bracket myself, but I try to maintain my skill level, despite not doing the stupid mileage I mileage I used to do whilst working.
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I drive an 18t rigid HGV and had this regular school drop. Access to the school being a 100 metre driveway that wasn't wide enough to pass another vehicle.
One time had this parent in floods of tears having to reverse back out so I could leave. She complained to the school saying I'd been rude, abusive. That I'd had the truck bumper to bumper. The school complained to my company.
Thankfully the trucks camera system proved all of her story to be a pack of lies.
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All the best, just take care and stay safe.
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