After two
Camino Frances I arrived at, what for me and my preferences, works for walking along the road safety. The suggestions can be itemized as follows:
1. Ensure that the OUTERMOST items of clothing and gear you are wearing are either color contrasting to the surrounding environment, OR are really bright, safety fluorescent colors so as to get an oncoming driver's attention. So, a white, pastel, or wild day-glo safety colored poncho, jacket, parka or fleece, or hat is better than black, brown, olive, navy blue, dark green, tan, rust, deep burgundy, burnt orange, purple etc. in this regard. The point is to stand apart from the background colors. The opposite of this approach would be to wear anything in a camouflage pattern.
2. On already bought items that are dark colored, apply day-glo adhesive reflective patches, available at any bicycling shop. When considering where to affix them, consider it from the perspective of you being a driver, approaching someone wearing this item. Which applique would work best at getting YOUR attention?
3. Consider replacing removable web straps on your gear with reflective day-glo safety straps. If you cannot locate a supplier for webbing by the foot / meter, buy an inexpensive dog or cat leash from a pet store that accomplishes the task and trim it to purpose. I am in the process of replacing dull grey straps with this sort of arrangement before my next Camino in 2015. I also use bicycle pants clips to fasten my rolled up rain parka, as well as velcro tabbed bicycle straps to secure gear to my rucksack. This way the straps do double-duty and are weight-neutral.
4. If you use a trekking staff or walking sticks, obtain reflective tape (3M makes it and sells it in most DIY stores). Cut the tape to suit and affix to create multiple "bands" around your sticks / pole. I have one band around each walking stick segment and another at the very bottom, before the tip. My carbon fiber staff has four sections so it has five bands.
I taught myself a trick with these stripped poles that always gets an oncoming driver's attention, especially if their headlights are on. You are walking facing oncoming traffic. You see a vehicle several hundred meters ahead, closing on you. Holding your walking stick or staff firmly in hand, rotate your right wrist to cause the stick with the reflective bands to swing in an arc into the oncoming traffic lane so the stick / staff is at least parallel to the road.
The oncoming driver should see the moving multiple reflective tabs moving in a 90 degree arc pattern similar to a propellor. If they do not see you they are blind, under the influence, or texting. THAT should be your cue to look for a place to dive into just in case they do not move. In my experience, after seeing the flashing wand, drivers tend to move more towards the center line to give me a wider berth / passage.
Lastly, LED blinky lights also work. I have used them with success. The right LED light can do double-duty as your on-the-road flashlight (torch). On balance though, I found they added (albeit marginally) to weight and sometimes got "misplaced." So, I have gone to reflective straps, tape, and bright contrasting clothing.
Someone commented about this recently telling me I would glow in the dark. My reply was that I would rather be a colorful clown than dark and deceased...
I hope this helps.
