I went to India in 2015 and took quite a few truck pix and popped them on here. Here’s the link:
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They’re there to deflect mud during the monsoon season.
Few more odds’n’sods
Lots of these articulated crane things around. Working on roadworks and construction, loading at brickworks, or on vehicle recovery. Accident recovery seems very busy.
Motorway jammed up ahead?
No worries; 3 point turn and drive out of it.
New TATA going out on delivery I guess.
Twin steer, twin drive, with a raising centre axle. Quite a few of similar configuration around.
The two extra crew seem to have no seat belts, nor seats.
Possibly it’ll end up as blinged as one of these?
Bloody luxury!
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Off topic, but a shot of the trail above La Jonquera and of the plane wreckage that is still there.
The crash was of French Civil Defence plane, DC6, lost fire fighting in 1986.
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Very interesting photos.
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As a last (possibly) comment on India, the rules of the road, as driven, not as written: India drives on the left (mostly) as does the UK
On dual roads
Slow vehicles on the left. Tuc-tucs, tractors etc.
Faster vehicles on the right lane near the central barrier. Trucks, cars, buses. Get in lane and stay there.
Even faster vehicles, faster cars and buses, leave the fast lane and overtake in the slow lane, returning to the fast lane.
On the wider bits it is OK to over and under take simultaneously. Pass a tractor in the left lane, and a truck in the fast lane by squeezing down the middle straddling the white line. see horn use later
I don’t know what the theoretical top speed on a m-way is, but the fastest I saw was about 80kph. It really is too unsafe to go any faster.
On roundabouts, go around clockwise, unless it is easier to go around ant-clockwise.
If overtaking expect smaller vehicles to give way to larger ones, but not always.
Use the horn all the time. Trucks etc often have signs asking others to blow the horn written on the back. Blow horn when overtaking, at junctions, when pulling away, when crossing junctions etc etc. Cities, villages, open road…blow the horn.
Some vehicles have no rear mirrors. Some do but only show an oversized load.
“Traffic Police” have whistles instead of horns. They are blown as energetically as arms are waved.
Cattle are everywhere, so are odd dogs and monkeys wandering around. All over m-ways, country roads and city streets. They are avoided by use of steering wheel and some braking.
The general attitude to life seems to allow this style of driving.
No one is at all put out if over taken. If you have to brake or steer to avoid someone coming head-on at you, on the wrong side of the road, you steer and brake, and carry on. No fist shaking, no shouting, no big egos involved.
I am not saying it is a safe place. It isn’t. But it is not as angry and tense as some more “civilised” countries.
As a comparison Morocco seems to be quite well ordered. At least there, some people do obey some signs, some of the time!
The Morrocans are much slower on the road than Indians. 
That is what I expected, but surprisingly didn’t see. Moroccan m-ways are more open than Indian ones, with less wildlife, domestic type animals, and less very slow stuff, so most Indian traffic seems quite slow, even on m-ways.
Driving the wrong way on Moroccan m-ways is seen but is noteworthy, in India it is plain ordinary.
I saw more recent accidents in one day in India than in weeks in Morocco.
I have seen the videos of buses being driven at silly speeds and weaving all over the place, but I would say they are not very commonplace, which is why they are filmed.
@franglais I can vouch for the fact that Indians drive in that manner and I haven’t left this country.
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Much of the reason for the difference is probably down to population density. So roads generally are quieter in Maroc than Inja (except in the city centres). When I was doing Morocco the first motorways were just being built so most of my driving experience there was on the old Nationals. Monkeys are a nuisance in India.
When I first went to Morocco early 2000’s the m-ways were almost deserted.
A couple of years ago they were quite busy.
Casablanca had the same sort of traffic you might expect around any Euro city. Marrakesh much the same.
The roads and drivers seemed 1990’s southern Euro to me…If that makes sense?
Good when new roads, but not finished-off around the edges? Lots of street lights that don’t always work? Drivers who sort of obey most of the rules?
The south and the out in the sticks less population away from the coast, so less busy. Not everyone has a car, but some had a modern electric bike. No landline, but a fully connected smart-phone.
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