I know it’s hard to capture Lightning on camera, but i’m hoping that one of you has some photos of this little DAF. It used to belong to Lightning Freight, who are no more, but i have had some emails from its old driver but he was never a camera man, so there are no pics to go with his info. One of must be able to help?? Email me, ben@truckblog.co.uk if you can help. It would be good to get some photos of it when it was out and about on the road.
I thought I better share some more of the genius that is Luke Vernon. An international lorry driver posting his love of driving on the interweb for all us less fortunate folk to enjoy. This time a trip to Spain and back in 3 parts. To make it easy for you all three parts are below. For those of us who haven’t been lucky enough to drive all over Europe sit back and relax and see what your missing, Luke’s expert commentary makes it all the more enjoyable (or not) depending on your own opinion. For the bracketed ones among you just turn the volume down, you can’t argue at the video quality!!
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
For those you haven’t worked it out, Mr Vernon’s videos are fascinating to me as I have never driver to half the places he goes, so I will be putting his vids here on the blog that I enjoy. If you want to see more please click HERE to go straight to Luke’s own YouTube page.
What happens on sunny Mondays in Suomi? It seems the answer is meet up with other Western Europeans heading home. Our little friend Steve Marsh has this week been to Pori, Finland (yes really, I know he has just come back from Cyprus…some people get all the glory!). After receiving his email looking for a reload, I had to admit that i’m not that big in Finland. The only person I could think of was Dutch long haul trucking legend, Frank Hoogenboom and his beautiful black V8 Scania. Mr Hoogenboom spends his weeks taking flowers from the Netherlands to St Petersburg, then he reloads in Finland on the way home. I sent Frank a message telling him about Marshy, but unfortunately the message got a bit lost in translation, so Steve Marsh headed to Finnlines Helsinki Port to ship back empty to Travermunde, Germany.
Low and behold I then receive this picture message from Marshy. It turns out he parked up next to Frank waiting for the ship. I dare say Frank noticed the TB sticker on the little MAN and a new friendship was born…..ha ha ha I make myself laugh! Any way, Marshy was gutted that when he checked the photo and it was blurry, but on this occasion I really like the effect. I better also mention the white Scania in the middle is also Dutch and I think it’s driven by Henk Prins. The little MAN would give the big Scania’s a run for there money mileage wise I reckon, although I think the big black V8 may have a coat or 2 more polish on it than the little MAN! 😉
How often does one website highly recommend another website that could be consider direct competition??….. Not very often is the answer your looking for. There seems to be a huge hump for many interwebbers to get over, that being sharing stuff! Even down to photo’s on the World Wide WWW Web, we all know people who get the hump when their photo’s are used by some one else. I understand this gripe and it can be annoying, but if we are happy to put our photo’s on the net for millions to see what more do we expect?! Surely its a kind of honour if others want to copy and use own our pics/vids?? Any way I digress. I came across Mr Vernon’s website this week after a recommendation from some one, but I can’t for the life of me remember who! Lorry-driver.com is basically all about Luke Vernon’s daily trials and tribulations of being an international lorry driver for Irish firm Virginia Transport, piloting his Scania across Europe from Norway to Spain and further.
What really kept my interest was Luke’s Youtube Channel. When I was a driving all of modern technologies were just coming to fruition and I did make a couple of videos while driving but nothing like Luke’s. If you like simple long distance diaries or just driving, his videos are for you. I watched his most recent one which was a trip to Denmark (Bertie Goes Home).There are 3 years worth to trawl through, which is surely enough to keep you entertained on your nights out. The video below is the first one Luke put on Youtube and I have watched it myself. I love it because in my too short driving career I never got to drive across the Alps, so watching this gives me a Darn good idea on what i’ve missed out on. I’ll be posting various vids from Luke’s archives on here and hopefully from now-ish onwards i’ll post up ALL new one’s. Sit back, relax and enjoy Luke’s diaries.
Over the Alps in 8 minutes. From Torino to near Lyon via Frejus tunnel in time lapse.
As it’s the weekend I thought it would be good timing for Part 2 of Ian Harpers Monaco F1 experience. In Part 1 we left Ian back in the “Dust bowl” above Monaco where all the trucks park up. Enjoy Part2 and some more cracking photo’s;
The morning after and my phone rings morning can you bring the box down we will see you when you get down so I sets off into Monaco which is as bad and as slow as getting into London city at 8 in the morning. Just over an hour later I’m on the harbour behind the start finish line by the motor homes, this is one busy area all the GP teams trying to set up all at the same time and a lot of them with little sleep as they came straight from Barcelona the night before.
Box off I was trapped in with other trucks so a little wander about, I saw a couple of Procar lads I knew who work for Ferrari and they were shattered but getting on with the job of building the motor homes.
I’m out and away calls made but no backload the may be one near Milan “Ok I’ll head that way then”. Back on the motorway by Ventigmillia the overhead signs are saying 38 degrees and it was luckily the air con was making it more bearable. My phone rings out with a text message “ Go to Curno details to follow “ I had a good idea where I was loading….I was right I was loading in Brembo Brakes, 2 pallets of brakes for Bentley at Crewe. Pallets loaded CMR sorted I’m away up the Brennero not a lot of time left on the day so into the big truck stop at Sadobre by the Italian tolls. Away in the morning over the fernpass , into Germany and there was a huge queue of traffic around the airport at Stuttgart. 2 and a half hours later we move, there had been an accident, a Romanian truck hit a car and flipped it over .
I made it to Luxembourg the queue for fuel was massive so went and parked up for the night and will do it in the morning, shower stock up with coffee and a dvd then bed early start. Fuelled up and away 6 hrs and I was back in the UK, I knew I wasn’t going to make it to Crewe so started the drive up and got as far as Derby cattle market. Into Bentley Motors in Crewe security say to me “Oh you should have rang us to say you were coming” on asking why these were some new development ceramic brakes and had to go to the R&D building and they wanted to know when they would be here. 15 minutes later tipped CMR signed delivery notes signed and I was heading back for Manchester and home.
Another good trip with the little Renault Midlum.
A quick bit of Ozzie history. A few nicely restored Mack’s, bought to us by one of the blogs roving reporters from Australia, Joe Hupp;
This is a Mack B-61 (6 cylinder) – seen here dressed up in the fleet colours of Jeffsan Plant Hire of Agnes Banks, NSW, Australia…..”Misty Blue”, as she is known, is a very popular truck for truck photographers like myself.
Next is of a Mack B-615RS (V8) – this one belongs to a one eyed and very fastidious Mack-man, Fred Goldspring of Rutherford, NSW, Australia. Fred has done a marvellous job in restoring this truck and I am proud to say that I have met him – he has every receipt for the truck from the time the truck was first delivered through to restoration receipts and many more!
Finally an iconic truck in Australia….this is the legendary Mack SuperLiner MkII (depicted by the square headlights) – there’s only one truck even more legendary here than a standard SuperLiner and that is the BiCentennial SuperLiner! There were 16 BiCentennial SuperLiners built in 1988 to celebrate 200 years of Australia – the man who owned Room 500 has a few of them!
Here we go, another Guest Writer spot on the blog. Not so long ago Ian Harper shared his diary of a trip to Rhodes. This time round he is back in the saddle of the little Renault Midlum heading off to a posh date with the Lotus F1 Team in Monaco. Nice work if you can get it! As it goes if you do fancy it, get yourself on Ian Harper’s books at Manchester PDS. Ian’s company specialise in supplying drivers to these teams and the concert trucking companies. Over to Ian;
On a rather warm sunny May 19th 2011 the phone rings;
“Fancy a trip to the South of France mate?”
“OK what when where?”
“Can you load some promo gear for the Lotus Renault F1 team and get it to Monaco for Monday morning?”
20th May the little Renault fires up and down to Heathrow to pick up some promo gear including clothing, caps, etc etc and a full size replica of the Grand Prix car (which I did not know what it was as it was in a big wooden box).
Loaded, strapped up, stop bars in and away we go as there was no big rush across on the train and then Belgium, Luxembourg, fuel up and into France. It was a gorgeous day, roads were lovely and quiet so the French motorways were replaced by some more scenic routes. A bit of shopping on the way and eventually pulled into Macon Truck Stop , I know this is not the greatest of places to stop but it was somewhere to park grab my bike out the back and ride into town and meet up with and old mate that lives there.
Parked up I sorted everything out made a call and couple of hours later, sat alongside the river having my tea and a few beers with my owd pal Dave. As I had half expected those few beers ended up as a lot of beers and on coming round on Sunday morning with the sun shining through on my face, dry gob and a mahoosive headache. I knew Sunday afternoon was going to be one of sleeping. Back at the Truck Stop there were a few usual Brits there, S&K from Wales, Stobarts (running to Monaco with the catering) and next to me a little DAF 7.5 ton of Kentvale Transport. His cab is the same as our Renault but has the Hatcher cab conversion on it and it makes the cab 3 times bigger, we had a natter brew and I was fading so to bed I went.
3am that morning up and away. The Stobart lads were just pulling out at the same time. I was away, the little truck plodding away on the quiet roads, sun coming up it was a rather pleasant morning. Breaks taken and on to the coast, the roads were busier but flowing but the amount of tolls along the way start to get on your nerves. My Instructions were to pull off and head towards Monaco and pull into the holding area aptly called the “Dust Bowl” which with all the trucks it definitely was!
I tucked myself into a corner in the shade and made a call I had 2 drops one at a hotel and one the day after in the paddock. I was on the phone as one of the Lotus trucks pulls in and the man on the phone asked if I would bring him down, as he needed a lift and he knew I was going to the hotel anyway.
All the promo gear was taken off and I was kindly given a press pack with a few goodies in it. Back to the dust bowl for me tonight with some of the other drivers. I tried taking some pics but they are not to happy if your snapping away so didn’t get to many.
Finally i’ve got round do doing as my wife said. “Do a Wilson Wednesday!” that’s what she’s been saying, so as all good men do, I listened to what she said. Two weeks ago I asked a random selection of HC Wilson drivers to send me a photo of what ever they had on that Wednesday, they duly obliged. Then because of holiday build up, I was useless and didn’t get round to doing the blog. While I was on holiday last week I got a few more photos sent over and because of no Internet in the Yorkshire Dales I couldn’t do the blog last week either. This week it’s game on!!
So the idea was really just a pictorial blog with pics of what the HC Wilson boys were doing on Wednesdays. Why Wednesday the simpler of you are asking?? Because “Wilson Wednesday” sounds better than “Wilson Thursday!”. The only thing being I can’t remember which photo is from which Wednesday. Above is SW51 HCW loaded with a JCB excavator, from driver James Cartwright (note the TB sticker in the windscreen).
Next Is R60 HCW with NB30, a 3 axle Nooteboom lowloader, loaded with what looks like an empty container handler. Thanks to Geordie for this one.
Double DAF power next. Both WIL 2218 & WIL 2219 loaded 22m long Rail Lines in Luxembourg for the UK. Both these 2 DAF’s are soon to replaced by new DAF XF105’s, hopefully some photos will come this way when they are road ready (hint hint). Drivers Ian “Slim” Godfrey and the always happy Geoff Tarbun.
This is V8 HCW with rather a large flat-rack on, i’m guessing heading in or out of Felixstowe. Gareth Rowlands at the helm, with Dodgy Dave Escorting.
I like this one, another James Cartwright photo. He spent all day following Taskers big black V8 Scania to Luckau to load crane parts. I like the honesty as he had no load to photograph so it’s a true pic of his days work. Nice one.
You will all recognise Tony Nunns ever-shiny 4 Series Scania. Pulling for Wilsons, a backload of auction equipment. How is it that a hard working truck, never, never seems to look any older??!
Another shot of R60 HCW, a credit to driver Stephen Pattison, or as everyone knows him, Geordie. Guess where he’s from?!
Finally we have 2 photos that aren’t true Wednesday pics, but for all I know they could have been taken on Wednesdays. 1st up is Geoff Tarbun’s Cuban Classic, very tidy Geoffrey. Looks like it only carries human cargo these days.
Finally my old bossman, GW, has been to Florida and as you can expect from a truck loving, haulage company owner, what else would he take in his holiday snaps?? You guessed it, an all America RED Peterbilt with a low-boy trailer complete with excavator load. All thats missing is the big white W on the front!
Before the holiday I put up a blog called “Rock Group” about the new EST trucks I saw at my local DAF dealer alongside the new Transam Trucking ones. All the same spec, I am actually really pleased to see that Transam will be keeping the EST brand going. Asking you lot for more info, one Adrian Cooper, has left the following comment, that is just to good for a mere comment, so i’ve honoured it with it’s own blog, and there’s a question that need’s answering too;
“Hi Ben,
As a fairly recent new reader of your site, very good by the way, I thought you might be interested in information I have found regarding the Transam Trucking/EST.
EST got into trouble about 15 months ago, and were about to go into receivership/liquidation. At the last minute, the later the cheaper I assume, Transam took over and agreed to take the business over and keep the name going. I am not sure if they will keep a presence in London, but shortly after Transam applied to increase the number of vehicles on their licence and also to move to a new site on the old airfield at Eye Suffolk. I assume near truck dealer Roy Humphries.
Since I finished working, I have not been past the above site so not sure whether or not it is operational.
Something some fellow bloggers may be able to answer, but up until recently Transam had megabox trailers. About a year ago, they introduced mega curtainsiders trailers. To my simple mind why? I would have thought trucking stage equipment, lighting booms etc would be safer in a box trailer. Is it because you can use a fork lift to load said items from the side so you save time and less roadies required? Be interesting to know why. Regards Adrian”
Has anyone any idea who’s this Scania is?? Found by a great sounding Dutchman and filmed and then found on YouTube by Hayden of Bennett. Can you shed any light on the truck or the load? I did wonder if it’s part of a collection or perhaps for some filming, but what do I know. Just listen to the Dutchman’s commentary, it’s wicked!
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