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Original poster

Biggest going the wrong way cockups

69 replies

Myboyonlybreakshisfavouritetoys · 05/09/2025 21:13

Today stopped on the way to holiday, then got on the wrong A road and drove back the way we came. Attempted to get off at next junction to turn around and then got back again in the wrong direction and had to drive another 6 miles in the wrong direction before I could turn around. 20 minute journey back 45 minute journey!

Help me feel less of a tit and tell me yours.

OP posts:
PlanetOtter · 05/09/2025 21:54

My sister went round 80% of the M25 in the wrong direction once - she was very new to driving and scared to turn at a junction.

Thankfully it was super early on Boxing Day morning, so very quiet.

AmandaHoldensLips · 05/09/2025 22:13

My friend Dave (actual name) got done for riding a bicycle the wrong way up a deserted one way street in Fulham the middle of the night. Dave, who let's face it had had a couple of bevvies, remonstrated with the copper about "shouldn't you be out catching actual criminals?" then got collared for riding a bike while drunk. It escalated into something you just couldn't make up.

I know this because I was sat on the crossbar and Dave was giving me a "croggie" home.

DollopOfFun · 05/09/2025 22:22

In an unfamiliar part of the country, I took the wrong turn off a roundabout and found myself heading down the slip road to join the motorway instead of back to the hotel I was staying at.

I stopped and reversed all the way back to the roundabout 😬

My only defence is that it was very quiet, very late at night and I was very pregnant.

ShinyAppleDreamingOfTheSea · 05/09/2025 22:33

PlanetOtter · 05/09/2025 21:54

My sister went round 80% of the M25 in the wrong direction once - she was very new to driving and scared to turn at a junction.

Thankfully it was super early on Boxing Day morning, so very quiet.

Do you mean that she went east when she should have gone west , or she was actually driving against the oncoming traffic ?

PlanetOtter · 06/09/2025 06:58

Oh gosh - east not west, not actually ok the wrong side of the road!! So it was time taking, no life threatening.

PoppyClippyCloppy · 06/09/2025 07:06

When we were 17 and one of my friends had passed her driving test we wanted to go to a shopping centre not too far away from us. We got on the motorway and drove the whole way around the M25 not realising there was a clockwise and anticlockwise. To top it off we did the same on the way back…🤣

ThinkAboutItTomorrow · 06/09/2025 13:06

Once missed a turn around Birmingham so ended up travelling from Bristol to Leeds via Manchester. I was young and it was in the days of paper maps and no phones so just took us ages to realise we’d even gone wrong.

Papyrophile · 06/09/2025 13:51

I drove the wrong way around the Hanger Lane Gyratory once! Fortunately it was 5:00am and there was only one other vehicle on the road...

Hoppinggreen · 06/09/2025 14:03

I was in York on Friday with 2 American clients in the car on the way to look at a house and I made a wrong turn and ended up in a school playground (secondary) at school finish time thanks to my stupid Sat nav
It was too dangerous to reverse so I had to do a 100 point turn in the playground assisted by 2 teachers while 2 others held the kids back.
Everyone found it funny and nobody got hurt and my clients thought I was great for staying so calm

Alltheburpees · 06/09/2025 14:10

I once went ‘up’ the ‘down’ on a long spiral access up to the car park in town. I was horrified when I got to the top and realised. Luckily there was space to turn around. I think if I’d met another car coming down, I would have run away crying. Reversing down a spiral doesn’t appeal. And this was pre sensors and reversing cameras.

PersonIrresponsible · 06/09/2025 14:11

In Russia. It took me eight hours to get out of a city called Perm.

I didn't realise you had to take the Ferry. I also didn't know what the word for Ferry was.

Twas stressful. Really feared I might never get out.

itbemay1 · 06/09/2025 14:12

ferry across Thames. Took wrong turn and ended up coming back through tunnel

KingscoteStaff · 06/09/2025 14:43

AAAAAAAnd I give you a train journey to...

Richmond, Yorkshire instead of Richmond, SW London...

I was travelling from Bristol. It was dark outside, There may have been drink taken...

Original poster
Myboyonlybreakshisfavouritetoys · 06/09/2025 22:46

DollopOfFun · 05/09/2025 22:22

In an unfamiliar part of the country, I took the wrong turn off a roundabout and found myself heading down the slip road to join the motorway instead of back to the hotel I was staying at.

I stopped and reversed all the way back to the roundabout 😬

My only defence is that it was very quiet, very late at night and I was very pregnant.

Haha these are great!

Accidentally joining a motorway is my idea of a nightmare!

OP posts:
TheNightingalesStarling · 06/09/2025 23:02

Living in Germany
DH had to go to a meeting in X Town about 6hrs away. His assistant programmed his sat nav for him.

Drive 4hrs.
Couldnt find his hotel.
He was in Y Town. Three hours from X Town. Had to get a different hotel and get up at 6am.

Made X Town... to find his meeting cancelled.

Frannieisnthappy · 06/09/2025 23:08

PersonIrresponsible · 06/09/2025 14:11

In Russia. It took me eight hours to get out of a city called Perm.

I didn't realise you had to take the Ferry. I also didn't know what the word for Ferry was.

Twas stressful. Really feared I might never get out.

I felt like this in Woking once. Am not joking.

Iwantsandybeachesandgoodfood · 06/09/2025 23:13

It’s hilarious that the M25 has already been mentioned twice. As a new driver with my non-driver friends, I spent 6 hours getting on and off at various junctions trying to go in the right direction. Eventually I call my dad who after laughing his head off told me that staying on it and going round the entire thing would have been quicker.

RattlingTin · 07/09/2025 01:30

I drove along a dual carriageway which had major construction works to connect a new link road. At one contraflow I took the left lane, following a pick up truck. Most other cars behind me also took this lane. When the road turned into rubble I realised that the truck I was following was a ‘Murphy’s’ and I’d driven into the works site. 🤦🏻‍♀️ The lads in the Murphy’s truck thought it was hilarious - glad they were in a good mood because they had to dismantle a load of barriers for us to get back on the road. 9 cars had followed me there - first man behind me thought it funny, man behind him was grumpy - I didn’t ask you to follow me, you bloody lemming!

FortuneFaded · 07/09/2025 03:13

My dad had a colleague that went for an interview for a job in Wales, back in the 1980s. No GPS etc back then. They lived in the North West of England. Travelled to the Camarthen on the train, arrived extra early, taxi driver didn’t know the name of the place. Lots of faffing about. Turns out the interview was in Caernarfon, some 3 hours away. 😂

LupaMoonhowl · 07/09/2025 03:28

Loving these!

thisoldcity · 07/09/2025 03:36

On my way to work there was a very big confusing roundabout, and if you ended up in the wrong lane you had to go 25 minutes up the road on the M1 to Milton Keynes and back again. I did it several times and always loved it if anyone else at work confessed to doing the same.

mothra · 07/09/2025 03:39

For those of you who know Melbourne, I once drove through the Bourke St Mall. It's a pedestrian mall (with trams). Absolutely humiliating.

A year later I did it again. In tears.

I still have a license, but no longer drive.

FortuneFaded · 07/09/2025 03:49

thisoldcity · 07/09/2025 03:36

On my way to work there was a very big confusing roundabout, and if you ended up in the wrong lane you had to go 25 minutes up the road on the M1 to Milton Keynes and back again. I did it several times and always loved it if anyone else at work confessed to doing the same.

I have done that a few times, and often I won’t be the only one making the return drive of shame.

thisoldcity · 07/09/2025 04:05

FortuneFaded · 07/09/2025 03:49

I have done that a few times, and often I won’t be the only one making the return drive of shame.

Show quote history

So annoying isn't it? And it was just about 5 minutes from work, the last little bit of the drive to work...and oh no here I go again...

RedRec · 07/09/2025 08:37

I cannot, ever, find the right turn off to IKEA Birstall, coming from the west on the M62, and always end up heading off somewhere else.
I have recently given up driving, not because of the IKEA cock-ups but the Gateshead Highway might have contributed a little to that decision (although I have never gone the wrong way on it!)