Do you live in a country where you drive on the right? If so, you're trained to travel on the right which implies counter-clockwise route. Also, most street lights seem to be set to prefer counter-clockwise movement so you'll hit less red lights if you follow this flow.
How does traveling on the right imply a counter-clockwise route? Given two equal-length ways of getting from one place to another, I'll probably prefer the one that involves fewer left turns, or more right turns. If the road is circular, and both places are outside the road, I'll want to go counterclockwise, but if both places are inside, I'll want to go clockwise.
Picture a circular road on a map. Let's say that my office is at twelve o'clock, my home is at five o'clock, and the post office is at three o'clock.
Now, suppose I have to leave work, pick up a document at home, and take it to the post office to mail it. I know it's faster to walk clockwise home, passing the post office, and then return to it with the letter. But my gut preference is to go counterclockwise, either because of an aversion to retracing my steps, or because that route just ... feels "cleaner" or more efficient somehow, or ... I can't articulate it any better than that.
Does anyone else share this intuition? Is it a manifestation of one or more known/studied effects?