England impressions

Maybe it’s the similar language, the northern location or Sam’s wonderful family and friends, but you can’t say enough about how nice everyone is in England.
I say similar language because even though Americans and the English share the same language, the vocabulary is much different in Britain.
There are, of course, the easily understandable words like “mate,” but others like “nackered” and “mucked” take a bit of getting used to.
For example, nackered could mean extremely tired — “I’m nackered after that trip to York” — or destroyed — “I nackered that tire (or tyre in England) after running into the curb.”
Getting used to the language is just part of the fun and makes for a more enjoyable trip.
Another reason why our trip has been more than we could have hoped for so far is because the English love to laugh.
Whether it’s making jokes or poking fun at one another, the mood is usually relaxed and amiable.
Who wouldn’t love that?
The mood is a little less relaxed on England’s motorways. Not for the English drivers, but the Americans in the passenger seats.
It’s pretty disorienting with everyone driving on the left side of the road, especially coming around corners and approaching oncoming cars.
For the first few trips in a car, my first instinct was shock and a little fear as approaching cars look like, at least to me, to be driving on the wrong side of the road.
Speed probably has a lot to do with it.
The English drive fast.
I thought the fastest drivers were either Texans or Nebraskans driving as fast as they can out of Missouri.
But they have nothing on the English.
The posted speed limited on regular roads is 60 mph and 70 mph on motorways or “dual carriageways.” It’s pretty common, though, to go 85 to 90 mph on the expressways and 75 mph on smaller, tighter roads.
Passing is pretty much allowed on any stretch of road, so you constantly have to look out for oncoming traffic all the time.
You get used to that after a while though.