Driving Hacks: How To Drive Your Car In Reverse Down A Steep And Curvy Driveway

Sometimes when you are parked at a house, they have a steep, curved driveway and no room at the top for you to perform a K-turn, so you can’t drive back down going forward as you are generally accustomed to. So you have to drive in reverse, but you are scared because the driveway is unfamiliar, and it’s nighttime and you should have left hours ago, plus maybe you had an imported beer or two, I mean you’re not drunk, just a little buzzed. Fine to drive. You do it all the time. Whatever. The point is, you are pretty certain that there is no way you’ll be able to back your car down the driveway without ramming into the wall or banging into one of the poplars or something.

The trick is to not use the rear-view mirror AT ALL. I know it’s hard to avoid that temptation, because you think: I am going backwards, I need to see what’s behind me. But you DO NOT. You can’t actually see the driveway back there, and plus you will get caught up in the “turning the wheel left turns the car not the opposite of the way you think it would” business that always comes with driving backwards.

Instead, you’ll want to hunker down low into your driver’s side mirror. Do not remove your eyes from the driver’s side mirror the whole way down the driveway. If possible, get it angled down so you can see the back left tire. Put her in reverse and go slow, and what you do is keep a tight but comfortable distance between the rear left tire and the edge of the driveway. When the curb starts to shift and get farther out or closer in from the tire, turn the wheel to compensate and maintain the distance. Just go slow and do that the whole way down and you will be all set. You will be back out in the road and off to see your other girlfriend or home to update your blog or whatever in no time. Serious. I hope you found this lifehack helpful.