Vehicles and long loads    Check out- http://.www.ltsa.govt.nz Any load which extends more than 1 metre behind the trailer must have a clearly visible white, red, orange or yellow fluorescent flag attached. The flag must measure 400 mm long by 300 mm wide. You might note that it doesn't say the flag has to be spread out, just a bit of cloth of those dimensions!! Also there has been mention of additional lighting for loads extending more than 1 metre-Fact Sheet 13 or do a search on the web site using "projecting loads" or "Fac+sheet 13" Basically, if the kayak extends more than 1 metre from the front and/or rear of the vehicle you will need to have lights on the kayaks. With one kayak, one light rear and at the front if it projects far enough there. Two lights if you have two kayaks as they will be more than one metre wide. Two half metre wide kayaks and a bit of a gap between them will add up to more than one metre in total. Allowing that LEDs are now very bright, from the specification "visible at night for 200 metres" it should be possible to make a cheap, bat­tery driven lighting system to clip on to your kayaks when carried at night. Here is the relevant wording from Fac+sheet 13 -Loads which overhang the outside of the body or deck of the vehicle by more than one metre to the front or rear, or more than 200 millimetres to the left or right side, need to carry special warning devices attached to the overhanging end(s) of the load. During the hours of daylight, there must be either: • a clean white, or fluorescent red, orange or yellow flag, at least 400 mm long by 300 mm wide, or • a frangible hazard warning panel, at least 400 mm long by 300 mm wide showing an orange diagonal stripe (200 mm wide) against a yellow green back­ground, facing forwards or rearwards During the hours of darkness, the flags or hazard panels must be replaced with lights attached to the load as follows:       • for loads over one metre wide and extending more than one metre from the rear of the vehicle, one red lamp (facing toward the rear) on each side of load       • for loads up to one metre wide and extending more than one metre from the rear of the vehicle, one red lamp (facing toward the rear) at the centre of load       • for loads over one metre wide and extending from the front of the vehicle, one white or amber lamp (facing toward the front) on each side of load       • for loads up to one metre wide and extending more than one metre from the front of the vehicle, one white or amber lamp (facing toward the front) at the centre of load       • for loads extending more than 200 mm beyond the side of the body of the vehicle, one red lamp (facing toward the rear) on each side of the load at the rear and one white or amber lamp (facing toward the front) on each side of the load at the front. These lights need to be clearly visible in clear weather at a distance of at least 200 metres during the hours of darkness. This applies to all vehicles, no matter when they were first registered.