But first I have to earn my keep and get some freight moved. My first run is down to Menominee, Michigan, then down to Frankfort, Indiana where I’ll be switching trailers to come back to the yard, turn around and head for Detroit, Michigan, deliver some more freight and then head up back into Canada to meet up with the tour and hopefully sample some of the Rock Star lifestyle.

I left home Thursday afternoon, popped into my local Coffee Shop for the obligatory Latte and made my way to the yard. I arrived just before everyone else was leaving to go home for the evening. My late start may appear strange, but it’s all part of the plan! That plan was to make it into Wisconsin tonight. The pick up in Frankfort was scheduled for Saturday morning, so the delivery appointment was made for Friday afternoon. Reaching Wisconsin tonight would leave me enough time to get to my delivery and then onto Frankfort before I filled my log book. By the time I could start again, my trailer home would be ready, another full day would get me close enough to the yard to be able to get there, switch trailers and head back down the road again far enough for me to be able to make it to Detroit by the following night, ready to deliver on Tuesday morning, that’s where the five P’s come in. Proper Planning Prevents Poor Performance.

As you’ll have seen from the photos posted from the California trip prior to this update, the white stuff is here again, as usual it comes and goes for a while at the start of winter. I had a couple of full days in it on the last trip, so I’m good and ready for whatever Mother Nature has in store for me this trip, it turns out that it would be wind, lots of it, no matter which direction I was heading, the wind was coming at me at 45degrees. This makes life difficult, for one I have to drive the truck all day, rather than being relaxed and just running down the road doing my thing, in strong gusty winds I have to be ready to keep things on an even keel. Secondly it really makes the truck work hard, pushing a Peterbilt sized hole in a strong headwind takes a lot of power, so the big CAT is working hard all day, this increases the noise levels and drains the fuel tanks. I pride myself on getting the very best from the equipment and as fuel costs are so high, getting good fuel economy is paramount, running into the wind puts a real hurting on my fuel figures and weather like today will bring my monthly mpg figures down dramatically, all my hard work so far this month is going straight out of my exhausts.

Day two starts as planned in Wisconsin, the wind has died down and it’s a nice sunny day, not for long though as my late start means that sunset is not far away, thankfully I’m heading East, so the setting Sun fills my mirrors and not my drop visor-less windshield!

I make it to my delivery, drive over the scale, get weighed and hit the dock. Within 15mins my trailer is emptied and swept clean, I scale again so the receiver knows exactly how much product they’ve received and with signed paperwork in hand I make my way south along the shores of Lake Michigan heading for the Windy City, but first I make a raid on my mobile pantry, before leaving, my Wife, bless her, had made me a few dinners, I put one in the microwave and enjoy a tasty Shepherd’s Pie for supper, accompanied by a home brewed Latte.

Now a drive through cities like Milwaukee and Chicago may seem wonderful, but I’ve done it that many times now that it’s just another day, or in my case late evening. Traffic was light and soon I was crossing the line into Indiana, a little over an hour and a half and I was pulling up to the Guard Shack at my pick up in Frankfort. Switching trailers here could not be more simple, the guy in the Guard Shack gives me a location to drop my empty trailer and tells me the location of my loaded trailer, hands me my paperwork and that is it, all I have to do is switch trailers, do a walk around check of the new trailer, check the seal on the rear doors and head back to the gate, I give them the seal number and then I’m on my way north again.

I don’t make it too far though, I’ve done a full days driving, so I head for a truckstop at the intersection with the interstate and grab a shower before I lay my weary bones down to rest for the night. In my 13hr day I’ve managed to make a delivery, pick up a loaded trailer and do the maximum amount of driving that is legally possible, I’ve had to time to stop for coffee and dinner, read a few chapters of my book and feel totally relaxed, no wait a moment, my bosses read this, edit edit edit! After a grueling day’s work, I just about summon up enough energy to crawl into bed where I pass out from sheer exhaustion, there, that’s better!

Day three starts with a home brewed Starbucks Latte and after my pre-trip inspection I start putting the first of the day’s miles under the bumper, a return trip through Chicago passes without incident and I’m settled into a nice cruise, my Sirius Radio keeps me entertained as the miles roll by. I manage to make it as far as the Illinois, Wisconsin line before my first stop; I need some of Starbucks finest and 361 needs feeding too.

Fully refreshed 361 and I resume our journey, Wisconsin soon turns into Minnesota and after a run through the madness that is Minneapolis/St Paul I’m back in the wilderness for the final few hours of my day, destination as far as my log book will allow. Tomorrow when I pull into the yard I’ll be turning around and heading back south again and I want to get as far as I can so that I have no problems making my delivery the day after that. It all goes according to plan and I make it as far as Alexandria, this is four hours from the yard, so by simple math I can make it back as far as Wilson, Wisconsin the next day which will allow me to make my planned destination for the day after.

As I’m running things quite tight I have a relaxing night in the bunk, my morning coffee comes courtesy of the espresso machine and I’m on the road and heading for North Dakota as soon as the log book allows, I’m going to head straight to the border and then the yard, I’ll have plenty of time to stop later in the day, but first I want to get all the potential hurdles out of the way. It all went to plan fortunately and it’s still daylight when I approach Fargo for the second time today, 361 is in need of some food and I’m feeling a little hungry myself so I pull into the Flying J and kill two birds with one stone. I’m comfortably within my self imposed schedule so I also take time to shower before heading into Minnesota again, I’ve only got to put the state behind me and I’m done for the day, four and a half hours left in the log book and four and a half hours to my destination, perfect timing.

Owing to the late hour my journey is trouble free and I pull into Wilson, my home for the night with a few minutes to spare, the rest of the trip should be easy now, I’ve done the difficult part, all I have to do now is go to bed, sleep, wake up and drive the rest of Wisconsin, run along the top of Illinois, navigate Chicago, enter Indiana briefly and then make my way across Michigan to the outskirts of Detroit, piece of cake………

I hit the snooze button inside my head a few times today, my bed was just so comfortable I wanted to make the most of it, I even set up the espresso machine before I got out from under the covers, the aroma of the coffee proved too much to resist, I was up and dressed before the last drip had fallen into my cup, a very civilized way to emerge from my slumbers, I make a mental note to configure some kind of timer so that I can use the heavenly aromas of brewing coffee to peacefully bring me to life in the morning, rather than the incessant bleep of an alarm clock hammering into my brain cells.

Time to hit the road again, I’m running down to the Wisconsin/Illinois line before stopping for fuel again, I have plenty after yesterday’s stop at Fargo, but Illinois has cheaper fuel than the surrounding states so I top off the tanks there to take advantage. From there I make it as far as the first service plaza in Illinois before I stop again, this time I need fuel, coincidentally there’s a Starbucks on site, how about that!

My caffeine levels restored I’m now ready to take on all that Chicago can throw at me, which was absolutely nothing to slow me down from one side to the other, now that’s how I like it, easy miles are much better than hard miles for both truck and driver. By now it’s dark again, I also cross into the Eastern Time Zone so lose an hour, another reason why I like running out west, over there I’m an early starter, but out here I have to get up an hour earlier, sometimes it’s still dark, ughhhh the mere thought of it sends shivers down my spine! Tomorrow will definitely start in darkness, my delivery appointment is for 7am, the closest I can get to the receiver and still be safe and secure is at least an hour away, so it means that I’ll be setting my alarm for silly O’clock.

With that in mind I blast on through a wet and windy Indiana and cross into Michigan, here the weather is no different, but the traffic is lighter and I’m not dazzled by oncoming headlamps too often. I pull into the Pilot Truckstop where I plan to spend the night and have a choice of places to park; I choose the one that’s most level of the bunch. How the people who plan these parking areas think that it’s acceptable for trucks to park leaning over to one side or another is beyond me, you’re either sleeping with your head or feet in the air, neither of which makes for a good night’s sleep.

My choice of a level parking spot did nothing to aid my sleep, the wind was howling and driving the torrential rain against the side of my sleeper, but being a true professional, I soldiered on and managed a full 9hrs inspecting the inside of my eyelids. My pre-trip inspection had me soaked me to the bone by the time I finished, so a change of clothes was necessary, I also discovered a leak in my sneakers (trainers) so they went in the bin (garbage) and my spare ones were called into service. My coffee was brewed by this time so with a fresh Latte in hand I ventured out into the morning mayhem.

Fifteen minutes ahead of time I pulled into the receiver, the rain was still falling hard and I was again soaked through by the time I checked in and got the trailer doors open, my wet clothes were misting up my windows and this coupled with a very small yard made hitting the dock a lot more difficult than it needed to be, this was compounded by another truck who could not wait until I had positioned myself and started backing I to the dock next to mine, the only problem was that the driver needed to be where I was to complete their maneuver, I had to pull completely out of my dock to avoid their trailer joining me in my cab! I expressed my dissatisfaction with the driver and was met with a blank look, they never even knew that they had nearly run into me, unbelievable, yet judging by the condition of their truck, it wasn’t the first time…..

I kept a close eye on 361 until the other truck pulled out, I was empty soon after and from there I had to get to the other side of Detroit and the bridge with Canada, unlike the gale force winds at the top of the Ambassador Bridge, the border crossing back into Canada was a breeze. All I had to do now was reach the outskirts of Toronto and find somewhere to leave my trusty steed tied up for a few days. I managed to roll through the GTA (Greater Toronto Area) before the afternoon rush hour and parked in a truckstop half an hour north of the city. I had spoken to the staff at the truckstop and they were fine with me leaving 361 there, I found a spot out of the way in a corner and waited for my driver to come pick me up.

The rain was turning to snow as night fell, then through the gloom appeared a sea of lights, my ride for the next few days had arrived. I had packed all the stuff I would need and in the midst of a snow storm Kerry Brandt and I transferred my stuff to one of the company’s new Peterbilts. I took the jump seat and Kerry had the steering wheel, of this I was glad, driving with the boss sat next to you is a bit unnerving; you tend to worry so much about not making a mistake that you end up making mistakes. I never thought that the same applied to the boss too; there he was driving a truck up the road with not only a driver sat next to him, but a driver who is going to write all about it and post it on the internet for the whole world to see sat next to him watching his every move.

Kerry, you can rest easy, you did an excellent job, I’m not the best passenger in the world, but I was relaxed and felt safe from the start, even though we were heading into what would turn out to be a pretty decent Winter Storm. As we travelled north the storm really kicked in, we were making reasonable progress, but we kept encountering people driving too safe, even though we were on a multi lane highway it’s not as simple as just pulling around slower traffic, these drivers are not only driving far too slowly, they’re also unpredictable and likely to panic when they get passed by a big truck, some of them also panic when they see you in their mirrors and slam on the brakes, which is about the most stupid you could ever do in such conditions, all this has to be taken into account when you approach them. I’m ashamed to say that it isn’t only cars that do this; some of the worst offenders are trucks!

We were not the only ones facing this, the bus drivers had to contend with it too and although the musicians may disagree, the cargo on the buses is far more valuable than the instruments and equipment Kerry and I were hauling. The bus drivers, Dwayne and David were taking it real steady around the curves; my first thoughts on this were that they too were a little scared by the snow and ice. They come from Tennessee and that area is not known for its bad winters, but that was not the case, these guys are true professionals, they haul Music Stars around the whole of North America and are as comfortable in the snow as they are in the sunshine. The reason for their slow progress is that they are trying to give the passengers as smooth a ride as possible so they can get some rest. The million dollar buses are set up to give a really smooth ride, but the most important component in all of it is the man behind the wheel.

If you have read any of my earlier entries, you’ll know my feelings about Paul Brandt Trucking, I have a very good relationship with everyone there, so even though he’s the boss man, being on the truck with Kerry wasn’t awkward at all, we had plenty to talk about as we were in a brand new truck, it’s a new model so it was a first for both of us and we spent the night talking trucks, oh and I did some sleeping, how about that, I slept on the job and did it in front of the boss and never got into trouble.

Eventually we pull into our destination, North Bay and park outside the venue, ready for the load in later that morning, even though it’s still dark we’re soon swamped with fans wanting to meet the star of the show, Mr. Paul Brandt, obviously we never reveal his whereabouts, not that he’s a diva, but he needs to have a break from an all too public life.

I lose count of the times I’m asked which part of Australia I come from, in the end I revert to my normal practice of telling people my name is Mick Dundee and I’m from Sydney, it’s a lot easier than telling them that I’m English because then I have to go through the rigmarole of explaining that even though there are 60million people in Britain, I don’t know their third cousin and have never met The Queen.

Kerry introduces me to a few members of the show, at this time the most important is Chris, she organizes the people and to keep her people happy they need feeding, so she organizes the catering. I go to breakfast and get formally introduced to Dwayne and David by Kerry, we all hit it off immediately. Barb, Kerry’s wife is on tour with us too; her responsibility is to keep Paul and Liz’s kids entertained. All the Brandt’s are good friends so she knows the kids very well as they’ve spent time together before. Barb also works in the office, so I know her too, she comes over for a chat and soon wanders off muttering something about us four being a Wolf Pack, we all take it as a compliment, even though I don’t think it was meant that way!

During breakfast band members started to appear, at first I kept my distance, but without exception they all came over to introduce themselves to me. I didn’t know who any of them were, but thousands and thousands of people all across Canada were paying good money to see them play, so they must be good at what they do, music stars they may be, but they act just like regular people at work, it was quite an eye opener.

The next part really blew my mind, I was standing around taking it all in when Paul Brandt himself walked past, I’ve met him a couple of times before, but I was still shocked when he walked up, shook my hand and said ‘Hi Mark’ He is the big boss on the whole tour and he may have known I was going to be joining the tour, but I never expected he would remember me, I have to say, I was a bit nervous, but that one moment made me feel totally relaxed. As big a star as he is, the next Brandt I met was the best one, for purely selfish reasons, Liz was walking past and although we had met before she never recognized me until she heard me speak, we had had a long telephone conversation about our shared passion for Starbucks, so she made a beeline for me hoping that I had found the nearest one already. Unfortunately North Bay is a barren wasteland when it comes to decent coffee so I had no good news for her.

All the while I was mixing with the stars, the crew were setting up the stage, I have never seen anything like it before, there are a trailer full of boxes being emptied, there were wires and lights and pieces of equipment I’d never seen before everywhere, it looked like total chaos, but was in fact a well oiled machine, everybody knew their job and it all went as smooth as silk, I was impressed.

Even though I had managed a snooze on the ride up, I was getting tired now and with a long drive ahead of us tonight a few hours sleep seemed like a good idea, that’s when I got the next surprise, I was told that there was a Mercedes outside to take me to a hotel, no sleeping in the truck for me anymore, I’m now a superstar trucker! The Mercedes wasn’t a limo, it was in fact a young lady, she was driving a Hyundai SUV and she took Kerry and I to our hotel, we asked to be collected again at 6pm so that we could grab some food and catch the show and with that organized it was time for some sleep.

After being collected by Mercedes we went back to the venue for supper, on the menu was rock star food, the whole gang eat together, there’s no them and us. At this early stage I have no idea of the rest of what Chris does, but as a foodie I can tell you she is very good at organizing catering. I was also given an all access pass, so I can come and go as I please, the show was about to start so I spent a few moments backstage before going out to join the fans.

As I said, I’ve met Paul Brandt before, the first time was when he put on a private show at the Paul Brandt Trucking Christmas Banquet a couple of years ago, so I’ve heard him sing, I have to admit that I’m not a big fan of country music, not because I don’t like it, but it’s not big over in England and as I’m a newish arrival I’ve yet to find my way around the music scene over here. One thing I can tell you though, I’m a fan of Paul Brandt, the show was superb and the whole band really gave the crowd value for money. As I knew I would be writing about it I did a lot of people watching and the crowd, which was made up of all ages were almost all on their feet for the whole show, I was probably the only one there who wasn’t singing along, until Convoy came on, that one I do know the words too, so I never felt so out of place during his fantastic rendition of this all time classic. Any of you that remember the video from the Paul Brandt version of the song may recognize one of our company trucks in it, Kerry Brandt was Rubber Duck on that day and he has a piece of the gate that he crashed doing 98 in his home office. If you do a Google search for Paul Brandt, the video is one of the first things that pop up; I highly recommend that you take a look at it.

Soon after Convoy the show came to an end…..almost, it was time for an encore, by the time that was over the crowd was almost hysterical, Alberta Bound, was clearly everyone’s favorite, the screams and cheers were almost deafening.

After the curtain finally closed the army of behind the scenes guys got to work, everything had to be torn down and boxed ready for the load out so that we could be on the road as soon as possible, we had to retrace our steps back down towards Toronto, tomorrow night’s show is in Peterborough. While all this was going on Paul Brandt heads out to the front of the venue for a picture taking/autograph signing session with the fans and here I witnessed something that I’ll remember for a long long time.

The queue of fans stretched far away into the distance, Paul had signed a lot of ticket stubs and various pieces of paper, he had stood with each fan while his assistant Tammy took a photograph with the fans own camera or phone. A fan approached Paul, she was clearly a little bit challenged and Paul greeted her by her name and said it had been four years since they had last met, now in the brief time I’ve spent in his company, I know he meets a heck of a lot of people, to remember this young lady was something else, I was quite moved by it all and I’m a tough guy trucker….on the outside only it would seem!

Personnel and equipment were all stowed on board their respective vehicles and it was time to hit the road again, it was my turn to drive and it was with some trepidation that I fired up the Pete. Here I was in a truck I’d never driven before with a brand new type of engine, a brand new and therefore tight transmission and my boss was watching my every move. I try and do the best job I can and I haven’t managed to mangle good old 361 in the three years I’ve had it, so I’m quite a competent driver, but my position as a writer and road tester in trucking magazines means that Kerry knows I can talk the talk, but can I walk the walk?

As you’re reading this on the company website I obviously can, my nerves settled after the first few gearshifts and I was soon in my stride. The snow covered roads that Kerry drove on the way up had been attended to by the local highway departments and I had clear pavement all the way, oh yeah!

There’s a clear hierarchy when we get out on the road, lead vehicle is the band bus, followed by the crew bus, then the truck and the supporting artist’s bus brings up the rear. The support act is a group of three brothers that come from Alberta, they’re called High Valley, I had yet to meet them and because I was stuffing my face, I never saw their act either, their bus was driven by Ray, who had told me that he’d spent a lot of time in Britain during the seventies, he claimed to have dated one of the girls that used to chase after Benny Hill at the end of his TV show, he also mentioned that he used to wear a fur coat too, so I didn’t know quite what to think about that…..

The drive through the night passed without incident, we were all having a good chat on the CB radio, during lulls in that Kerry and I were talking trucks and trucking again interspersed with, hopefully enough, sucking up from me. I’m a bit of a night bird, so the run through the night presented no problems. I followed the excellent example being set by Dwayne and David in their respective buses and we motored on into the night, taking special care to give the precious cargo a smooth ride. Railroad crossings and sharp curves were the only thing to hamper our progress and soon we were nearing our destination. As we entered the city limits of Peterborough we had to make a few sharp turns, one of them was a 120degree turn to the right and as I made the turn Kerry was looking out of the side window at the trailer as it cut the corner. I told him not to worry as I had done this kind of thing once or twice before, I then missed a shift and Kerry chuckled as he said ‘Are you sure about that!’ perfect timing, well by one of us anyway.

As we had a long drive down, load in was going to be soon after our arrival, so after some shuffling of vehicles we were all in place ready for action. Today I elected to stay with the truck, there were two reasons for this, the first being that I wanted to watch the whole set up and secondly, we were parked on a city street, I wanted to be around just in case the truck needed to be moved for some reason, we were also in a high street location so amenities were close by, when I say amenities, I’m referring to a decent cup of coffee. I had also finished my book and wanted to resupply, on the drive in I had spotted a book store a sort walk away so I had plenty to keep me occupied before I hit the sleeper for some rest.

Breakfast time came and the crew bus doors opened and one by one the crew emerged, after a snack they had a lot of work to do, load in involves a lot of physical work, as well as careful planning, it is all organized by Rob, as Chris takes care of the people, Rob takes care of equipment. You would have to see the amount of stuff to believe it, but to give you some idea, it fills a 53ft trailer from front to back, each box has to be taken off in a specific order, some have to be unloaded before the next ones can be brought out, I stood around trying not to get in the way and watched in amazement at first and then bewilderment, finally I started going dizzy, it was like watching a movie in fast forward, I have no clue how they manage it all, but at the end of it everyone had a smile on their face, so they must’ve done it right.

After a successful shopping trip in the book store and freshened up with a Latte (or two) I went into the venue to watch the band doing a sound check, it was a spur of the moment thing and what a good decision it was, here I got to see a bunch of guys doing what they were born to do, unlike when they’re performing in front of an audience, during a sound check they are under no constraints and they really let loose on their instruments. It was amazing to see the chemistry between them all and there was a lot of humor involved too. I got the impression that the shows were work and this was play, they certainly seemed to be enjoying themselves. They have quite a grueling schedule. They had already been on tour for over a week, before that there was all the planning and promotion, rehearsals down in Nashville and then travelling around between shows, always through the night. Music fans will probably be very shocked to find out the amount of work involved in a tour, all they see is the band on stage, if they had any idea of the amount of work involved, as true fans I bet they wouldn’t want to put their idol through such a punishing regime, I get tired just thinking about it so I retire to Hotel Peterbilt and take a nap.

My nap was rudely interrupted, I had set an alarm so that I could watch the show again, I went with the aim of people watching again, but Mr. Brandt had worked his magic on me and I was now just another fan, I even recognized some of the songs, I wasn’t quite singing along yet, but I knew some of the choruses by now. The show itself has a few twists, one of which is from keyboard player and backing vocalist Greg Sczebel, he has a chart hit of his own and it’s nothing like a Paul Brandt song, his actions are nothing like a bit of foot tapping and guitar playing either, he dances/jumps around the whole stage as he sings the song, again, you have to see it to believe it. Greg is definitely one to watch, not only does he have talent, he also has personality. During the show a Gibson Guitar is up for grabs by the winner of a competition which has fans tweet during the show, the best tweet is the winner, during moments when he is playing the keyboard with one hand he was tweeting with the other hand, it was very funny and didn’t go unnoticed by Paul Brandt and the rest of the band, they shook their heads in dismay, but the crowd loved it. Another highlight came courtesy of a song from Paul’s new bluegrass album, first Paul gives a little history on his rise to fame in a competition at the Calgary Stampede, then tells of how he met wife Liz and then they, along with lead guitarist Jeff Senn do an acapello version of the first single from the album, this is my favorite song of the lot.

The curtain closed, it’s now time to load out, again I watch proceedings trying to make sense of it all, I fail miserably, but everything gets loaded on the trailer again and everyone is still happy, now it’s time for my part. Kerry had left earlier in the day to attend a meeting at a charity he’s involved with so I was on my own in the truck, we were only going a short distance and once we arrived I was then going to sleep the rest of the night before Kerry’s return the following morning. The plan was then to reunite 361 and I so that I could go and get a load on to take me back out west, my brief time as part of the crew was drawing to an end, I was sad to leave in some ways, but also glad to back behind the wheel of my trusty steed and doing some trucking again.

My load was just down the road from where we had left 361; those P’s are playing their part again! Once loaded I was the one who was Alberta Bound, heading for Calgary a three day drive away. The journey home had me knee deep in snow at times and poor old 361 lost its shine very quickly, but that’s what it’s made for. I managed to call into the house on the way through and see the family; I also picked up fresh supplies, not as fancy as the tour food, but just as tasty.

From Calgary I returned back to the yard and had a few days off, before heading up to Edmonton to rejoin the tour on the western leg, this time I would be copilot to Bill Brandt in yet another brand new Peterbilt, even though I was being unfaithful, 361 would wait patiently in the yard for me. You can read all about the rest of the tour in the next instalment of the Paul Brandt Trucking Blog, see ya soon…….

To compensate, at the end of the story, I’ve put on a bunch of pictures, they’re a mix match from various trips and there’s a little note describing each picture. Normal service will be resumed next time around, I’ve got a safety net in place to prevent future technical disasters.

It’s time to head down to the Gulf Coast for this trip, I’m a bit backed up and this should have been posted a few weeks ago, but I’ve been a busy boy lately, all the Starbucks in The World wouldn’t have given me enough waking hours to get everything done and still write this blog. I have had plenty of home time, but it seems that I’m a lot more popular than I thought I was and the end of summer was one get together after another. I have been out on the ATV with my friends, been to and hosted cook outs in the back yard (garden for my English friends) and been to weddings, birthdays and anniversaries. I also helped a very good friend clear his yard, we cut down fifteen 50ft trees without incident, it was the 16th that caused all the problems! Still with some Duct Tape and bubblegum we managed to make sure that his house is still waterproof!

The original plan for this load was for me to head out to Alberta to load and run straight down to Texas, Bill and Kerry Brandt had sat down and plotted a whole month’s work for me so that I could visit each coast, but like a lot of things in trucking, plans are sometimes just wishful thinking. In this case the customer had asked for their freight to be delivered a day earlier than originally requested. Unfortunately the appointment to load the freight had already been made and to ensure that the delivery happened on time I would have to miss out on the run to Alberta and dispatch would send another truck who was already in Alberta to collect the load, run it through the night and bring it back to the yard in Morris, ready for me to set off with the following morning.

I timed it just right, I had just finished loading my gear into 361 when the trailer arrived in the yard, dispatch had already made up my Custom’s Paperwork, so I did my pre trip inspection, hooked up to the trailer and started on the long road south. First stop as always was the border with The USA, again it was a breeze and I hit I-29 within minutes of arriving. The CAT Scale at The Gastrak Truckstop had to be navigated before I put a dent in today’s mileage quota. The load I had on was heavy, the previous driver had scaled and moved the axles, but we have different tractor units, so better safe than sorry. CAT Scale is run by the owner of the World’s biggest Truckstop, the Iowa 80, which strangely enough is on I-80 in Iowa, but they have a scale in all the major truckstops, their promise is that if you weigh on a CAT Scale and your weights are legal, they will defend you in any court case for an overweight ticket, if there are any fines levied they will pay them and the scale in question will be recalibrated. It’s a good safety cushion and at $9-50 for the first weigh and a buck for any reweighing if the first one comes up no good, it’s a bargain too.

My weight was all in the right places and I had enough leeway to fill my tanks in Fargo, so I set my mental GPS and hit the road. The sugar beet season has started now and there are old farm trucks running between the fields and the giant stockpiles close to the processing plants, I get to see some real old trucks, some are from as far back in time as the 70s, I got a load of pictures but I had hit a swarm of bugs just after leaving Pembina and they made a real mess of my windshield so the pictures ended up on the cutting room floor.

The Plains now have a new source of wealth, since the dawn of time, or 1776 in the case of America, working the fertile soil in the area has been the main source of income in the local economy, but now Black Gold has taken over. The Bakken Oilfield, which has reserves estimated to be over 500 billion barrels of Petroleum Grade Oil, the Bakken Oilfield also reaches under Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Montana as well as North Dakota and the evidence of New Money is plain to see, it really is a boom town around here now, the Oilfield itself is to the west, but there’s not a lot of civilization out there, so cities like Grand Forks and Fargo are the places to go for the Oil Workers to spend their new found wealth.

The problems will come in the next year or so when people in the eastern part of the State leave to get their share of the Black Gold and the towns they leave behind become a shadow of their former self. House prices will also rise as the money no object Oil Companies need places for the crews to stay, it will make it very hard for local people to get on the property ladder in years to come, unless they work in the Oilfields. The rural landscape around here is going to change, that’s for sure.

Fargo looms through the slimy mess the bugs left behind, I pull into the Flying J and take on some motion lotion, whilst pumping the fuel I pop the hood and use the window squeegee that lives at each pump to clean my windows. After fuelling and collecting my receipt I pull into the truck park and make myself some coffee, there’s a severe lack of Seattle’s best export in this part of the World, but I had come prepared. Starbucks also sell coffee beans to make a good cup of Java at home, as I’m a connoisseur of coffee I have bought myself a small Espresso Machine to make the most important part of my Latte, I use my microwave to heat the milk rather than the steam wand, it’s cheating, but it makes a good Latte and as an added bonus it makes the cab of 361 smell of freshly brewed coffee, that’s better than any air freshener scent on the market, so I’m a happy bunny.

Suitably refreshed I hit I-29 again and finish of the first of the Dakotas, apart from a sign marking the occasion there is no outward sign that I’m now in a different state, a Dakota is a Dakota, the only difference for me is that North Dakota is closer to home than South Dakota and usually that’s a good thing, today though the reverse is true, I’m going south so the further I get from home, the quicker I can get back there.

There is also Oil in this Dakota, although not part of The Bakken, it still manages to produce 125000 barrels of crude per month, it would appear that the Farmer is going to remain number one in this area for some time. The State is divided in two by The Missouri River, to the East lie the farmlands, to the West it’s less fertile and rockier, so the Farms there are Ranches and the Cattle roam freely. In this part of the State the economy is led by tourism and The Military, whereas in the East with its bigger population, the service industry leads agriculture in the economy.

I stop in Brookings, South Dakota and stock up with groceries from an important part of the service industry, Walmart, I’ve found a mix for authentic Chinese Curry Sauce, it tastes exactly the same as the stuff they used to pour over my chips (French Fries) on the way home from the pub back in London. I make a curry in the parking lot and use a precooked chicken from the rotisserie for the protein, I use a spoon and a fork to eat it, I may be able to cook like an Asian, but I can’t use chopsticks like one!

From Brookings I only had a little bit of Interstate left until I started heading west for a bit, I could go down through Topeka, Kansas and pick up I-35 all the way to Dallas, but cutting over to Yankton, South Dakota and going down through Nebraska is the shortest, and therefore quickest route, it’s an easy ride with a few towns to liven things up a bit after the vast emptiness of the Plains.

I stop for the night in York, Nebraska, I could go a little further, but a big green sign catches my eye and makes my decision for me, my morning Latte will now be served to me instead of the self service ones I’ve had today. I pop a DVD into my laptop and snuggle up for the night, I’ve got a big day to do tomorrow and need to get on the road as early as I can so that I can make the final run into the customer on the morning of day three, with that in mind I decide against The Godfather Trilogy and settle for a repeat viewing of one of my all time favorite movies, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest.

I wake up as the birds are finishing their Snap, Crackle and Pop, I look at the clock and shudder, at least my friendly Starbucks are open, I perform my ablutions in their restroom and scoop up a couple of Lattes before the obligatory pre trip inspection and the first of the days many miles go under the bug splattered bumper.

Nebraska is very similar to the Dakotas, except the fields yield Corn and not Beets. The corn fields do provide a source of fuel though, but not Black Gold, this time it’s Ethanol, which is a Biomass fuel, brewed, or whatever they do to it, from natural plants, it provides a cleaner, cheaper fuel than regular Gasoline (Petrol for you Brits) It is also home to the World’s richest or second richest man, depending on the Stock Exchanges, Warren Buffet, a very modest man who among other things owns most of Coca Cola.

I run south on US81, it’s a good fast road and although it’s boring like the rest of the big roads in this part of the World, it allows me to get the job done, burning the Black Gold is my job and the big CAT/Peterbilt combination are doing that very well today, a nice tail wind helps with fuel consumption. When I say boring, I mean from a taking photographs and admiring the view perspective, for a trucker’s point of view it is Nirvana, flat ground, zero traffic and long straight roads.

Nebraska soon turns into Kansas and again, nothing much changes but it does get noticeably warmer, this is saying something too, we’ve had a fantastic summer up in The Frozen North this year, but Kansas hot is even hotter, not surprising when you think that Kansas was still part of Mexico until 1848, it doesn’t affect the growing of Corn though as the fields are full of the stuff, until I reach the outskirts of Wichita and the Corn is replaced by Cows being fattened up before their final journey to the huge Meat Processors in Cow Town. As I hit the Kansas Turnpike I fire up my I-Pod and blast out Glen Campbell’s classic hit, The Wichita Lineman as I keep heading southbound.

The tailwind continues to push me south, appropriate really as the State of Kansas is named after the Indian Tribe that inhabited it, the Kansa, said to mean ‘People of the wind’ There is also Oil in Kansas, it’s the 8th largest oil producer in The US with a monthly production of 2.8million barrels. It’s also home to one of the World’s largest salt deposits, which is just to the east of Wichita. The main industry in these parts is the aforementioned Meat Packers and the Aviation Industry, more light aircraft are built here than anywhere else in the World.

For me though the most important statistic is the fact that Kansas also has the second largest state highway system in the country after California. This is because of the high number of counties and county seats and the intertwining of them all. I’m only concerned with the one that takes me to Oklahoma and I make good progress to the State Line, where I pull in and raid my groceries for a spot of lunch.

Refreshments are again provided by Starbucks and my in cab Espresso maker, lunch is Sausages, Mashed Potatoes and Baked beans, with two slices of bread and butter, traditional British Fare and very tasty too. Now it’s time to hit the road again.

The name Oklahoma comes from the Choctaw phrase okla humma, literally meaning red people, it is very important in Native American ancestry, there are 25 different American Indian Languages spoken within its boundaries, the most in any state. Like Kansas to the north, aviation is also important to the economy as Oklahoma is home to the largest airline maintenance base in the world, which serves as the global maintenance and engineering headquarters for American Airlines, but where Oklahoma really shines is in energy production.
Oklahoma is the nation’s third-largest producer of natural gas, fifth-largest producer of crude oil, and has the second-greatest number of active drilling rigs and ranks fifth in crude oil reserves. As a whole, the energy industry contributes $35 billion to Oklahoma’s gross domestic product, and employees of Oklahoma oil-related companies earn an average of twice the state’s typical yearly income. In 2009, the state had 83,700 commercial oil wells churning 65.374 million barrels of crude oil.
I had to find out all this information as driving through the state is one of the most uneventful journeys ever, made even worse by the preceding states being exactly the same, save for the color of the dirt at the roadside, In Oklahoma it’s reddish brown, in Kansas, Nebraska and the Dakotas, it’s just brown! A brief respite from the emptiness is provided by the Capitol, Oklahoma City, but it’s short lived and I’m soon back out on the Plains again.
Thankfully I can get a move on, Texas looms, Texas is the second largest U.S. state, behind Alaska, with an area of 268,820 square miles. It is 10% larger than France and almost twice as large as Germany or Japan. If it were a country, Texas would be the 40th largest behind Chile and Zambia. I have to go from one end of it to the other, so no time for messing around.
An hour or so after crossing the State Line, I pass Denton, the spiritual home of 361, I take the right fork in I-35 here and it becomes I-35W, it takes me past Fort Worth rather than Dallas, not that it does anything to the volume of traffic, it is crazy around here, especially after the empty roads I’ve had almost to myself for the last 1000miles.
As anyone who has watched Dallas on the TV will know, or done a Wikipedia search as I have, Texas is Oil Country, it all started on January 10, 1901, the first major oil well in Texas, Spindle top, was found south of Beaumont. Other fields were later discovered nearby in East Texas, West Texas, and under the Gulf of Mexico. The resulting “Oil Boom” transformed Texas. Oil production eventually averaged three million barrels per day at its peak in 1972.

This oil boom contributed to the Texas economy, Texas has the second highest GSP (Gross State Product) in the U.S. Its GSP is comparable to the GDP of India or Canada, which are the world’s 12th- and 11th-largest economies, respectively. Texas’ economy is the fourth-largest of any country globally, behind England, California, and Tokyo.
Texas has known petroleum deposits of about 5 billion barrels, which makes up approximately one quarter of the known U.S. reserves. The state’s refineries can process 4.6 million barrels of oil a day, The Baytown Refinery in the Houston area is the largest refinery in America. Texas also leads in natural gas production, producing a quarter of the nation’s supply. I make good use of all this oil, as a glance at my fuel gauge reveals that the drive down through the busy Dallas/Ft Worth Metroplex has put a dent in my personal oil reserves and I’m in need of some go go juice, a visit to a Flying J is called for, luckily for me there is one just before I pull off the Interstate at Waco.

From here on I’m off the Interstate and running down the back roads, they’re good, fast roads though and except for slowing for a few towns, I make good time, almost as fast as the Interstates, but with a lot more to see, mostly Longhorn Cattle and Oil Wells, of course there are the obligatory fast food joints too, but my belly and my pantry are full, so I drive past instead of driving through. I do make use of one though, I need a place to lay my hat tonight, the log book is at bursting point, luckily my previous eating habits have given me an encyclopedic knowledge of fast food joints with truck parking.

It’s a hot one tonight, so the big CAT stays purring away, providing me with much needed air conditioning, I’m still in the wide awake club, the day may have covered many miles, but they’ve all come easy, a couple of episodes of The Sopranos is called for before I go to sleep.

Up early again today, I have a couple more hours to do to my destination, I’m on schedule to meet the revised delivery time, so it’s not a mad rush, but there’s no time for dilly dallying. My destination is Seadrift, it’s right on The Gulf of Mexico, this is a strategic point for the Petrochemical Industry, Oil is piped in from the offshore rigs in the Gulf to the refineries, during the process of making the stuff we pump into our vehicles a lot of by-products are produced, these go into almost every man made object in the World, in this case I’m delivering to a Plastics factory, my load is a by-product of Gas production and combined with some other by-products it will make the raw ingredient of many things that touch our everyday lives. People often think that Oil and its use is contributing to destroying the Planet just so that we can all cruise around in big cars and trucks, but Diesel Fuel and Gasoline production are just the tip of the iceberg for the Oil Companies, they sell far more stuff to the Petrochemical Industries so they can make raw materials for other companies to make products that we use every day, take the laptop that I’m tapping away at now, its shell is made from plastic, which comes from Crude Oil.

I arrive for my appointment a little early, I have already gone through the safety induction necessary to go inside the huge plant, so checking in was a formality, I presented my ID card from my induction, my driver’s license and the truck registration and insurance and after my details were recorded, I made my way to the unloading dock. Thirty minutes later I was back at the gate, trailer empty and swept out ready for the next load.

I already had my reloading details, the shipper was located in the town where I parked up last night, so it only took a couple of hours and I was going backwards again, this time I hope there are no Crude Oil by-products in my load, it’s a full load of dips, the yummy kind that you dip your Tortilla Chips into. I’m picking up over 20tons of the stuff and by my calculations it would take ten trailers full of Doritos to scrape every drop from the jars of dip, that would be some party and you would need a rather large bowl!

I’m back on the road again in less than an hour, I’m going to take it easy today, I’m already close to the point of being able to make it back to the yard in two day’s driving, so an easy day won’t hurt. I’m still going to get as far as I can, but I have no destination fixed in my mind, I’m going to see how it goes, ideally I want to get to the Oklahoma Line, but if I do, I do, if I don’t, well it’ll still be there in the morning!

As it happens I do make it back into Okie, just. After a trouble free run back up through Texas I stop a mile north of the State Line in the huge Casino, although I don’t go inside, by the look of it the owner has plenty enough money, no need for a contribution from me. Tony Soprano finishes my day off and I head to the land of nod, with no alarm for the first time this trip, oh yeah….

Alarm clocks are unnecessary when you have a black truck, the scorching sun heats things up to unbearable level about 2mins after it raises its head above the horizon, but that doesn’t deter me, I fire up 361 and let the A/C cool things down to a more agreeable level and I’m soon back in dreamland, although I do set an alarm before I go back to sleep, just in case, I’m in no rush, but there’s a fine line between a leisurely start and wasting most of the day in bed.

The day starts off with a pre trip inspection as always, I also make up a couple of Lattes to see me through the morning, I’m planning on using every minute I have today and I can’t do that without a decent coffee or two inside me. This run is taking me back along the roads I came down on, apart from a brief step off route to get my load on; the return trip has been a mirror image of the outward journey, although I stop in different places on the way back. I motor on through OK City and stop for a bit of lunch just before leaving the State, again it’s stuff from my pantry and refrigerator. I decide on Chicken Breast and Rice, my only dilemma is which sauce to cover it with, Jack Daniel’s BBQ sauce is the eventual winner, it turns out to be a good decision. I make another couple of Lattes and make my way back into Kansas.

It’s no more exciting heading north, but again, the open roads are a beautiful sight to see, I’ve got the Motown Channel playing on my Sirius Radio, the soundtrack is perfect for my mood and before I know it, I’m back in Nebraska, I only have to put this place in my mirrors and I’ll be done for the day and have a reasonably easy day tomorrow to get back to the yard and after that, home for a few days.

Taking full advantage of the empty roads I continue on into the night, the country roads are taking me home. The farmers are busy out in the fields and as well as harvesting their Corn, they’re also stirring up the insects, my windshield is becoming opaque, so I stop a couple of times and pop the hood, jump up on top of the big CAT engine and do my best to clean off the carnage they leave behind. I’ve got it down to a fine art now, there are a number of special products designed for this very purpose, but nothing beats a drop of dishwashing liquid and water in a squeeze bottle, some elbow grease and a handful of kitchen towels.

I may not have a lot to look at, but I can see it clearly once again! From the darkness a glow appears in the distance, this means a town and seeing as I’m at the top end of Nebraska, it must be Yankton and the start of South Dakota again, I have a bit of time left to run, but decide to cancel the rest of the day due to a severe lack of motivation, I’m doing really well for time, no point in driving late into the night when I can do it tomorrow, I also have a yearning for a Cheese and Ham Toasty, my in cab Sandwich Toaster will be helping me out with that very soon. I park for the night just east of Yankton and enjoy my late night snack as I watch another episode of The Sopranos. It’s then time to jump in to bed.

No alarm again today, I also parked on the west side of a building so that the Sun didn’t wake me as it heralded the start of the day a few hours ago. Parking a truck is not just a case of abandoning it in the first spot you find, to get a good night’s sleep you have to factor in many things. The Sunrise being one, in the summer you don’t want it streaming in through the windows, in the winter, you do. The same applies to wind, in the winter you need to park facing in the same direction as the wind, at ambient temperatures in the minus forties, the wind can make for a cold night, not just for the driver, but for the truck too, whereas in the Summer, a nice cool breeze flowing through the air vents can make for a comfortable sleep. My foresight the night before had paid off, I awoke feeling refreshed.

The usual in cab Latte, ablutions and pre-trip inspection were my first course of action today, from there on in I just had to point 361 due north and get back to the yard. The construction crews are busy repairing I-29, but the lack of traffic meant that it caused me no hold ups. I just sat back, cranked up the radio and watched the miles roll by, South Dakota became North Dakota, America became Canada and 361 returned home. I uncoupled from the trailer, put the Bills of Lading up on the board for the driver who would be delivering this load to Alberta, put my trip paperwork in the relevant slot, unloaded my gear from the truck into my car and that was another week and a few thousand miles, down and in the books.

The next update will follow shortly, I just need to get tapping away on this here keyboard, but first I need to do some trucking, so I’ll be seeing y’all very soon.

The yard, hard working trucks taking a well earned break.

361 ready to roll.

The road to the border.

The border.

The first snow of the season, more to follow, lots more!

It may be a pain to drive in, but snowy scenery makes a good picture.

A rest area north of Madison, Wisconsin.

The little yellow trailer I picked up in Indiana, that’s why I was running bobtail.

Awwww, how cute!

More snow, this time in Montana

Typical Main Street, USA

Heading for the mountains.

I love driving along roads like this.

Spectacular scenery and the snow is starting again.

Taking a break.

Being paid to see places that people pay to see is one of the perks of my job.

Although I do earn my money when the roads are like this.

Hard work, but satisfying work all the same.

I found the road under the snow again, woo hoo!

I spoke too soon!

More of the same, a fantastic view from my office window.

Delivering the freight.

I lowered the landing gear whilst being unloaded to protect the reefer fuel tank from hitting the ground when the fork truck went inside the trailer.

The cockpit of 361 at night.

Peterbilt and Kenworth, bitter rivals, divided opinions, I guess you can tell which I prefer as I’d rather push my Peterbilt than drive a Kenworth!

Hammer down time.

The white stuff again 

Ice Road Trucking.

Getting a bit old now this snow, only another 5months to go and it will all be gone!

At least the highway is clear, it’s getting cold though.

Cold enough for 361 to need an overcoat.

There’s a pattern beginning to emerge.

Another job completed.

Back to the East Coast again this week, the first trip in this series never actually got me on the beach, this trip does that, my delivery is for Virginia Beach, Virginia. This is a popular holiday destination and is also home to a huge Sea Container Port and Naval Base. You cannot get any closer to the Ocean without getting wet.

My day starts in darkness, if you’ve read earlier installments of this blog, you’ll be thinking that I’m talking about the evening, but no, this darkness is the one that heralds the start of a new day and being that it is summer, that means that it is real early, even the birds are still asleep.

As always I need coffee, luckily in the town where I live there is a coffee shop, the owner of which, thankfully, must be an insomniac as he is open at this ridiculously early hour. I get the first two Lattes of the trip, one to drink now and one in my ‘to go’ cup and head off to the yard to reunite with 361.

The issues I had with overheating on the previous trip had been taken care of by Kenny and his gang in our shop, the radiator was flushed and the water pump replaced, the original water pump was still working fine, but company policy is to do things properly, so it was replaced. We operate along the same principles as the Airlines, the shop keep a record of component failures and wear rates and use this to replace parts before they fail, it helps to keep the show on the road. From a driver’s perspective this is a good philosophy as it minimizes the risk of ending up on the shoulder with a breakdown.

I also have some new shiny bits too, they’re under the hood so not on show, but when I flip the hood the first thing I see are the new braided hoses and shiny is shiny so I’m happy. There are new Shock Absorbers all round too, which is nice, I need a soft ride as I get older. While I’m under the hood I do my daily checks of fluids and all the other stuff that makes up a pre trip inspection, next step is to make up my bed and put everything in its place inside the cab and then head down to the border.

I’m joined by two fellow Paul Brandt drivers, George and my Uncle Dave, George is heading for Milwaukee, Dave is going to sunny SoCal, I’ll stick with George for the whole day, but Dave will leave us at Fargo as he heads west. We set off in our mini convoy and take Highway 75 from Morris to Emerson and the border with The United States.

As usual, the border crossing is a painless process, I get sent through the Mobile Scanner, it’s a giant X-Ray Machine that looks at the complete truck, trailer and cargo. I soon get the all clear and make my way down to the Gastrak Truckstop at Pembina, the North Dakotan border town. My colleagues are all good, but my load is a bit heavy on the trailer axles, with the assistance of both Dave and George I slide my trailer axles and reweigh, this time it’s even heavier at the back! Three professional drivers with over 70yrs of experience between us and we had moved the trailer axles the wrong way, this had overloaded them even more! My excuse was that it was still way too early for me, the other two I cannot speak for, but I have my suspicions……

Legal at last, we hit the road south, as usual I-29, direction Fargo. We’re going to stop at Fargo for a coffee and then the crowd of three will become two’s company. The run down I-29 is trouble free and we soon back off to the Double Nickel to avoid the attention of the North Dakota State Patrol, they’re always hiding somewhere within the Fargo City Limits, both on the north-south I-29 and east-west I-94, it takes eight minutes from one side to the other at the limit, so unless it’s a medical emergency, speeding will make no difference to your day, except that you’ll be on the shoulder handing over your license and registration to the State Trooper and a couple of hundred bucks a week later when the inevitable ticket is due for payment.

We grab a Latte from my old friend Ronnie McD, Dave heads off west, George and I head east on I-94, poor Dave has over 390miles of North Dakota left to do, we have only six before we enter Minnesota, we’re heading for St Cloud for a late lunch. I tried out a Bar and Grill which is located in a strip mall adjacent to the Pilot Truckstop at exit 171, it’s called RJ’s and if you’re in the area it’s well worth a try, the food is amazing.

First we have to negotiate the DOT weigh station a few miles inside Minnesota, we get called in, everyone does when it’s open, they don’t participate in the PrePass scheme. The bypass lane is the closest we come to meeting the Scale master, they have a ‘weigh in motion’ sensor in the approach lane, it senses that all the hard work the Three Stooges had done back in Pembina had put me under the legal limits and so we sailed on by.

Two and a half hours later, we pulled into the Pilot and parked our wagons, the culinary delights of RJ’s just a short walk away. We both decided on the Chicken Pot Pie, I could fill the rest of the blog with superlatives describing the mouth watering goodness that passed my lips, it was made even better by George picking up the tab, ker’ ching….

Early evening and The Twin Cities is not a good mix, but we managed to get through before the lunatics left the asylum for the day, even the construction, of which there’s plenty, did little to hold us up and soon we’re crossing the St Croix River and into the Badger State, Wisconsin. It’s a six and a half hour drive from our yard if all goes well and it had all gone well, we had four and a half hours left to run on our log books and would be making full use of every available minute, I didn’t need to, but Georgie Boy had a delivery in Milwaukee, so he needed to get as close as possible to avoid another early start.

Now, all this trucking day in and day out can take its toll, both on truck and driver, but the way we operate means we have the freedom to do it the way it suits us best, to a point. A lot of companies tell the drivers what time to start and that’s all the information they get, sometimes there’s no contact at all, save for a message on the satellite Communications system installed in the truck, every aspect of their trip is managed by somebody behind a desk, a desk that can be thousands of miles away from the truck, one that can’t see weather and traffic conditions, or even that the driver is hungry and needs to stop for a snack.

At Paul Brandt Trucking, we too have a Satellite, it’s useful for Dispatch to send reference numbers and appointment confirmations, but we also speak to Dispatch, we know what time we have to be at our delivery, we know how long it takes to get there, 99% of the time we know where we’ll be heading for our next load, so it makes it easier to plan your trip, some guys like to get up early and finish early, some, like George and I, prefer to start a little later, but even we have to start early sometimes, especially on the East Coast where we lose an hour as we run our logs on Central Time. Having all the information at our disposal the day before we leave to go to work makes our life as drivers much easier, in turn, it also makes the Dispatcher’s job a little easier, having a personal relationship with the drivers means they get to know our strengths and weaknesses, they then allocate the work accordingly, obviously as one of the more prestigious companies, they expect that their drivers know how to do the job without constant instructions, from my point of view. I love this system, as much as I enjoy my job as a trucker, there are parts of it that I don’t like, my relationship with my Dispatcher means that I’m seldom disappointed with my instructions. Not that I’m a Prima Donna, I take the rough with the smooth, but let’s be honest, smooth is much better.

Speaking of smooth, it seems that it’s a word missing from the vocabulary of Wisconsin Road Builders, the I-94 is giving my new shocks a work out this evening, this combined with the constant watching for Deer running in to the roadway can make this part of the trip hard work, but a quick stop for a Latte keeps the senses alert. We complete the remaining miles chatting on the CB radio and soon pull in and park for the night.

Ten hours later my slumbers are disturbed by the ringing of my alarm, George and I have a synchronized pre trip thing going on, we also take part in a long established morning ritual together, ablutions followed by a Latte, George heads off to his delivery, I make my way to a truckwash, as you know, I like to keep 361 looking at its best, I’m also going to wait for George to make his delivery and run across Chicago with him, so I have time to kill. I have a confession to make too, next door to the truckstop is Starbucks, I am weak and have no willpower, I just have to go inside and order a Latte, I can’t help myself.

George also has a penchant for fine coffee, so I’m forced to have another before we head into Chi Town, he justifies this by saying that the rush hour traffic will have died down by the time we get there, personally I don’t care, a Latte is a Latte.

Our traffic forecast was accurate and the Windy City was a breeze…. We made excellent time and soon we were hitting the Indiana line, a few miles down the road we went our separate ways, George to Lebanon, Indiana for a load back to Edmonton, Alberta, me to the I-80/90 and onwards towards the coast. Usually I would also head down I-65 with George, but having time to kill in Milwaukee, I had gone online and checked the weather, my Sirius Radio had announced on the weather reports that there was a chance of Tornadoes from south eastern Indiana all the way through the bottom of Ohio and into West Virginia, my normal route to my destination. I’m not one for putting my head into the Lion’s Mouth, so I elected to run the northern route and stay away from the ugly weather, besides 361 was looking all clean and shiny, no point in letting all the hard work from the truckwash go to waste.

We’ve travelled along the Indiana Toll Road together before, so you’ll be sharing my frustration as I sit at the barrier waiting for somebody to answer the intercom, as usual the EZ Pass reader does not pick up my transponder, even when I climb onto the catwalk and wave it directly at the reader, I’m even more annoyed this time as I get abuse from the woman at the other end of the intercom, apparently it’s my fault that their machine cannot read my transponder, I point out that every other toll road in the country can read it, ore abuse follows, maybe that’s why there’s an intercom, a face to face conversation would probably have a nasty outcome if they speak to everybody like that, there are armed people likely to take exception, me, I go for reverse psychology, I exaggerate my British Accent and become even more polite, this either calms them down, or really gets under their skin, either way, I don’t care, I’m a lover, not a fighter.

The rest of Indiana passes by without issue, I stop at the eastern edge to fuel, I have enough to see me into neighboring Ohio, but that IFTA thing means that the Hoosier State is the place to fuel. I use a Pilot for my fuel and make myself some lunch from my supplies, with minimal equipment, I’ve become quite the chef recently, today’s offering consists of Chicken Breast in Sweet and Sour Sauce with Vegetable Rice. Some of it is store bought, some home made, but I read the labels and always go under the recommended daily allowances. As well as eating tastier food, I’m going to see the benefits to my long term health; no good can come of eating fast food all the time, that is a fact.

Ohio next, the toll booths at the start of their Turnpike have no problem reading my EZ Pass and I keep on rolling as the computer registers my arrival in the Buckeye State, apart from a brief visit to Starbucks it’s hammer down all the way for me, hammer down as far as the 65mph speed limit that is, Ohio State Troopers have a saying ‘At 67 you’re fine, at 68 you’re mine’ they are very vigilant too, they really take it seriously, so does Mike the Safety Director, so far my butt has not touched his naughty step, I hope to keep it that way.

There’s not much going on alongside the Turnpike, but my Sirius Radio keeps me occupied as the miles roll by, I’m listening to the replay of Freewheelin’ with Chris and Meredith, I missed it this morning as I was chatting with George on the CB, but now I have no such interruptions. As I’ve said before, I love this show, a couple of New Yorker’s who had no prior relationship with the Trucking Industry, yet they really get it now, they occasionally have some serious topics, but mostly it’s just a good old free for all, I find it very entertaining.

By the time the show is over I’m approaching the toll booths at the eastern end of the Ohio Turnpike, the reader does its thing again and I roll on towards the State Line and the PA Turnpike, here the reader manages to communicate with my little transponder at highway speeds and I’m soon on the outskirts of the home of the world’s foremost ketchup, HJ Heinz. None for me tonight though, I’ve got places to go, people to see.

The place is Breezewood, the people are those that appear in my dreams, another day’s work is done, two early starts have seen me arrive here with ample time to take my mandatory ten hour break and still make it to my delivery by tomorrow afternoon, it’s that knowing what I’m doing before I’m doing it thing, it really works. However, first I must sleep.

I awoke from either, a dreamless sleep, or one with a completely unmemorable dream. Now I’m back to reality, it’s time to truck. I have new places to go today and new people to see. A wash, a Latte and a pre trip inspection come first though. The shower was provided by the Travel Centers of America, TA for short and the Latte was provided by the Barista in Starbucks. The pre trip was all my own work and while doing it I got chatting with the driver of the truck parked next to mine, he was very complimentary about 361 and full of questions about driving huge Road Trains out in Australia, it’s the accent again, no matter where I go, people’s first thoughts are that I’m an Aussie, sometimes I tell them I’m British and sometimes I have a little fun, today I was in a mischievous mood, so before I wished him a G’Day, Bruce, as I called him, was left thinking that I used to pull six trailers through the outback and that I wrestled Crocodiles in my spare time.

In North America there are two seasons, Winter and Construction, the sun is shining today, so that means construction, but although this part of the highway system and this part of the country is very busy, the only obstacle it presents is a lower speed limit, I’ve allowed for the unexpected as I’ll be skirting the Nation’s Capitol today, this can be very busy and as it’s construction season you can almost guarantee a back up somewhere along the way, I was not to be disappointed, as soon as I left the Keystone State behind and entered Virginia there was construction everywhere and a sea of brake lights way off into the horizon. Coming from Britain I’m used to this, over there we have 60 million people, every single one of them used to wait until I was ready to go out on the road and they would leave five minutes before me, it was not unusual to spend four hours or more to go less than a hundred miles, this is a piece of cake in comparison.

A small piece of cake as it happens, I’m soon heading south on I-95, DC in the mirrors and the Marine Base and FBI HQ at Quantico somewhere off to my side in the trees. I soon branch east again at the I-64 in Richmond, home of the big Tobacco Companies. I spot a very welcome sign, the familiar sign that adorns the best coffee cups in the business, Starbucks, truck parking nearby too; it’s as if they knew I was coming. I get a to go order for two, one in my Starbucks Thermos Cup for later, one to ease the pain of the next hour.

The pain of a traffic back up, the tunnel that takes me under the Chesapeake Bay is a notorious bottleneck, today it’s at its worse, traffic is backed up for eight miles according to the Gantry Signs, I’ve planned for it, but one day it would be nice if I wasn’t always right!

I make the delivery with half an hour to spare before my appointment. Thanks to some hard work by the guys on the loading dock, I’m on my way, Bills of lading signed, before I was due to get there, I love it when a plan comes together.

Another visit to Washington DC now, my first pick up in Aberdeen, Maryland, is just to the north. As well as being home to my pick up, the Aberdeen Proving Grounds are located here, this is where a lot of weapons testing and other top secret stuff is done. To get to my pick up I have to use the entrance road to the Proving Grounds, there is no left turn, so I have to make a right and then turn around. I don’t go far enough to see anything; just as well really, I’m sure there is a lot of security there.

My log book is nearly full for the day, usual practice here is to drop my trailer on a loading dock and go off to park for the night, however they’re on top form tonight, they tell me to stay hooked to my trailer and within twenty minutes I’m loaded and have my paperwork in my hands. Under normal circumstances this would please me, but I’m stopping here for the night, there’s a truckstop just up the road, but it’s next to a rail line and when a train passes by, which is about every ten minutes, it feels like an earthquake. Usually I park in a quiet little spot I’ve found, but it’s not big enough to get into with 53 foot of trailer behind me, so I have to tough it out at the truckstop. I manage to get a decent night’s sleep as it turns out, the weather is hot, very hot, so I need my air con, to get that I have to run the truck all night, the gentle rumble of the big CAT engine masks the noise of the trains.

No alarm clock this morning, my next pick up is near Boston, Massachusetts. This means I have to go up through Delaware and onto the New Jersey Turnpike, rush hour here is a serious business, much better to let the madness die down before I get out there. I have to time it right though, because there’s a fine line between missing the morning rush and the start of the afternoon rush hour, not down in the Garden State, but further north. I have to go over the George Washington Bridge and then risk life, limb and suspension on the Cross Bronx Expressway as I pass to the north of Manhattan, then I have to head up into Connecticut and on to Rhode Island, this is where a large part of the New York City workforce live and the back ups are horrendous, it’s the only part of the world that I’ve experienced traffic volumes that equal those in London, I moved half way around the world to get away from that, so timing is everything today.

That doesn’t mean I have to miss out on a cup of Starbuck’s finest, have to get my priorities right. 361 needs a feed too so I also need to suck up some motion lotion. As I’ve said before, Pilot and Flying J are our preferred fuel suppliers south of the border, they’re pretty thin on the ground in the densely populated north east, as are truckstops in general, so I have to grab it while I can, I do have the ability to use other places, but I may as well top off the tanks here, it will last me a couple of days and will get me back into the Midwest where the price is a little lower than the notoriously expensive north east part of the country.
Tanks full and my thirst quenched, it’s time to hit the road again, my first hurdle is the Delaware Memorial Bridge, hopefully it’s a taste of things to come, traffic is very light and I don’t even come to a stop at the toll booths, the EZ Pass doing its thing again. Signs for Atlantic City start to appear, I haven’t yet visited, but I’m keen to have a stroll along the famous Boardwalk. I’ll be able to make comparisons to my childhood walks along the Esplanade on the Isle of Wight, my Mother is from there and we used to visit every year, I have many happy memories of days with my Grandparents, Uncles, Aunts and Cousins as we ran along without a care in the world, as only a child can. I very much doubt that Atlantic City will have the same effect, especially as now I’m officially middle aged, running does not feature in my plans, unless I’m being chased by a fierce dog!

Sirius Radio fills in the gaps when I’m done with reminiscing, I missed Chris and Meredith, but I’ll catch them on the replayed show this evening, today is all about Classic Vinyl, I have some songs stored in my favorites and one was being played, my radio gives me an audible warning when this happens, so I changed channels from the BBC World Service to hear the dulcet tones of Creedence Clearwater Revival and Run through the Jungle, after that it was locked into some good old fashioned Rock Music until the evening.

With my 70s soundtrack I made good time up the New Jersey Turnpike, I stopped off to grab a Starbucks at the last Service Plaza in Jersey. All around here are sights that will be familiar to almost everyone with access to a TV, the Oil Storage Tanks from the opening credits of The Sopranos, to the Manhattan Skyline, with the Empire State Building standing head and shoulders above its peers.

Soon the traffic starts to slow, but I can see the toll booths for the GW Bridge and EZ Pass again makes life simple, I’m soon crossing the Hudson River and looking to my right at the Big Apple, you’ll have heard of my love for California, but my favorite city in the world is NYC, I go there every chance I get, my Wife and I spent a week there when she came on the truck with me, Bill, Kerry and Tracey Brandt were kind enough to allow me to take a week’s vacation there after I had made a delivery nearby, now that’s what I call looking after your employees! Although I wish I was still being paid by the mile, I nearly walked my feet off going from store to store. I also spent a week there for my eldest daughter Chloe’s 16th birthday. They’re both in love with the city too; it really is an amazing place.

No time for hanging out now though, the Cross Bronx Expressway is taking up all of my attention, the roadway is falling to pieces, there are holes big enough to do serious damage to a bulldozer, so I have to keep focused, I have to watch out for the other road users too, most of them must be Volunteer Fire Fighters on the way to the Fire House, they’re all in such a hurry.

361 and I both emerge unscathed from the ordeal, I’m leaving the Empire State behind for a while, next on the list is Connecticut, I motor on until the first Service Plaza, my belly thinks that someone has cut my throat, I’m ravenous, actually that’s a little white lie, but on a past visit I discovered that they serve Foot Long Chili Dogs here, as yet I’ve been unable to pass by without stopping to grab one, they may not fit in with my new healthy living regime, but I’ll live on Lettuce Leaves and Tofu for the rest of the year if I have to, I will be eating one of these bad boys every time I pass by, FACT!

Now I’m full, really full, time to work some of it off with some trucking, only a few hours to go now before my pick up in Randolph, Mass. Freewheelin’ provide the soundtrack and I’m soon in Rhode Island, not far now, after all the excitement and happy memories of the Big Apple, this part of the trip is a bit of an anticlimax, but there are still some pretty sights along the way. The houses in this part of New England have a very nautical air about them; some of them located on the water’s edge are magnificent. On a moonlit night they truly are a sight to behold, not at this time of year though, the sun is still high in the sky as I leave it all behind and enter Massachusetts.

After crossing the State Line I’m soon at the outskirts of Bean Town, I’ve not had the chance to visit the City Center yet, but it’s another place high on my list. I want to visit the bar that appeared in Cheers, among other things, other things that include eating fresh Lobster and maybe sampling some of the local brews, purely in the interests of research, you understand.

As I lick my lips at the thought of some steamed crustacean the miles roll by and I’m pulling into my pick up, way ahead of schedule, hopefully they’ll load me early. I’ve already mentally adjusted my game plan, if all goes well here, I’ll make it back into New York tonight and set up camp in State Capitol, Albany.

Luckily for me, I get on well with the shift leader here, he comes from Argentina and he thinks I’m a little bit loco. When he found out I was English and revealed that he was Argentinean, he thought I would want to talk about the Falkland Islands, or Malvinas, as they call them, for those that don’t know, our countries fought a war over these islands, situated off the coast of Argentina in the early 1980s, we won (hahahaha) but I said I don’t care, they’re welcome to them. What I wanted to talk about was the travesty that occurred in the World Cup when Diego Maradonna, possibly the greatest footballer the World has ever seen, put the ball in the net with his hand, out of sight of the referee, thereby ending England’s World Cup Campaign and breaking the heart of a nation.

My friend soon has me loaded and on my way, I point 361 west and head for Albany, my home for the night. Again truckstops are thin on the ground, but there’s a rest area on the outskirts of the city, there always seems to be room to park here, tonight was no exception and I’m soon shut down for the day. No alarm tomorrow either; I’m way ahead of schedule and have plenty of time to get back to the yard. I’ll still get back as quick as I can, but I feel no need to upset my Circadian Rhythms.

Totally refreshed, I rise from my slumbers at the crack of 10am, today will see off the rest of New York and Pennsylvania, this trip is a bit of an odyssey, from the High Plains to the Midwest, through the Appalachians to the East Coast, from New England into the Great Lakes before hitting the Midwest and High Plains again, before crossing the 49th Parallel and entering the Prairies of the World’s second largest country, my adopted home, Canada, I’ve visited fifteen States and now I’m about to revisit eight of them for the final run home, there’s still a long way to go. This trip is going to run very close to filling up my log book. I’m allowed a maximum of 70hrs work in a rolling 8day period, each day I use 15mins for my pre trip inspection, I use 15mins every time I fuel and checking in at a shipper or receiver has to be logged as 15mins too, even though it’s usually a 5minute process. Loading and unloading may take longer, but I’m not involved in that, the time is my own, so doesn’t count against my 70hr total. Even so, the 15minutes logged for these activities comes off my 70hrs, a really full on week will see me do a maximum of 66hrs driving, allowing four hours for all the other stuff, I normally get this done in 6days. Once I hit 70hrs that’s it, I can go nowhere until I’ve reset my hours, I can do this by parking for 34hrs, unless I’ve spread the 70hrs out over 8days, on day 9 I get my first day’s hours back, it sounds more complicated than it is and I simplify things further by running the 70hrs out and resetting, I usually manage to achieve this at home and quite often I’ll make double sure by taking two or three days off before heading out again, legally I only need the 34hr break, but all work and no play……

This trip will run into seven days, the day from Breezewood to Virginia Beach and on to Aberdeen didn’t fill my daily hours, nor did yesterday’s run up the East Coast, so it’ll leave me time to make it to the yard before a reset is necessary, of course something could go wrong and get in the way of this, but I’ll let you into a secret, I’m at home writing this, so I know that it never, I made it back with a little time to spare!

This is how I managed that, from Albany I ran to Elkhart, Indiana, from there, after a night in the sleeper, I ran to Rothsay, Minnesota and after another night of beauty sleep I did the final 200 miles back to the yard, the beauty sleep hadn’t worked, I was refreshed, but still not pretty, but let’s backtrack a little, I’m still a long way off the yard, plenty more ground to cover yet.

I start by leaving Albany and New England behind, pass through Syracuse and the Finger Lakes region. Rochester and Buffalo are next, I’m now in the Great Lakes. A little while after Buffalo I leave New York and cross into Pennsylvania, a quick stop in Erie for a windshield wash and then it’s down to the Ohio State Line and I’m soon bypassing Cleveland and merging with I-80. I join the Ohio Turnpike and stop in the first Service Plaza to take advantage of the Starbucks located within, while I’m there I take a free shower and have some in cab cuisine, today’s culinary tour de force is Tuna Salad, yippee…..

The miles pass by easily, the Great Lakes become the Mid West and Ohio becomes Indiana, my EZ Pass is picked up by the toll booth at the eastern end of the state, that’s a first! My joy is short lived, I need fuel, so have to leave the Toll Road, the Toll Booth cannot read the EZ Pass, so I go through the painful process of shouting into an intercom, thankfully this time I’m not subjected to a tirade of abuse. I get my fuel at the Pilot Truckstop and rejoin the Toll Road, the EZ Pass doesn’t work, again, so I grab a ticket and head off to do the final miles of the day. I park for the night at Elkhart, close to the renowned Notre Dame College, I have no choice, I’m out of time, but proper planning means that I have parked in a Service Plaza with a Starbucks, so tomorrow will start with some milky coffee based goodness, oh yeah.

Again I allowed my body to decide when I arose from my slumbers; I’m about to head into Chicagoland, no point getting up early to sit in heavy traffic. I have my Latte, get my pre trip inspection done and head out on the road, today is going to be a big day, I need to negotiate the remainder of Indiana, including the shambles that are the toll booths at the western end of the state, then into Illinois, through Chicago, up into Wisconsin. Then onwards into Minnesota, around the Twin Cities and then a two and a half hour run to my chosen parking spot at Rothsay. It all goes well; I get through Chicagoland without a problem, even the construction zones. I say goodbye to Illinois and cross into Wisconsin and stop for lunch in a rest area near Madison. I had salad again, I’m actually starting to enjoy it now, it must be some psychological syndrome.

After lunch I motored on, I let Sirius Radio provide the entertainment, I was very random today, my remote control was put to good use, I was switching from channel to channel like a manual version of IPod shuffle. I arrived in Minnesota as darkness fell, that’s a good thing, after the Twin Cities I’m heading directly west, a setting sun is a beautiful sight, for sure, but not so much fun through a windshield. I arrive in Rothsay as the clock struck midnight, time for bed.

I awoke to a horrible noise today, the sound of an alarm clock, today will be the easiest day of the whole trip, it also has the best destination, home, I have no access to Latte, not until I reach Fargo, North Dakota, a 40minute drive away. Pre trip inspection done, I join the Interstate and point 361 west. I leave Minnesota and enter North Dakota at Fargo, a quick stop to top off the fuel tanks, diesel fuel for 361, Latte for me; all is good in the world now. I leave the Flying J Truckstop, join I-29 and finally point the mighty Pete north.

I-29 runs up through the fields of North Dakota, not a lot to see really, just Canadian trucks rolling south, it’s all over in two hours, the border with Canada is looming through my windshield, no queue today, so I pull up to the window, present the paperwork to my load and my Passport and within two minutes I’m jamming gears again, the final miles going under my still shiny bumper. I arrive at the yard, unhook from my trailer, park 361 and begin unloading my gear from the cab, another week’s work done, I’ve done a lot of miles, seen some wonderful sights and I’m ready for the next trip, but first I need to go home and have some time with my family, a truly happy ending.

Feeling fresh and relaxed after a couple of days at the house I’m ready for some action now, I’m heading for the beach, quite literally, as my delivery is to Costa Mesa, California. As I’ve said before, I love going to California, it’s not an easy ride, not by a long way, but it’s all about the destination, people all over the world pay thousands to visit the place, I get paid to go there, that’s my kind of deal.

With my gear stowed away in the mighty Pete, I make my way south to the border with The United States and after Customs formalities are taken care of, I scale the truck and get my weight in the right places. That done it’s now time to get down to some serious trucking, my first stop will be Northstar Truckwash in Fargo, North Dakota, I don’t often drive past this place, I like to keep 361 looking tip top and the bosses agree, we have an account there to make it even easier for us. They do a very good job there, washing a black truck is only slightly less difficult than doing algebra in Latin whilst underwater! I’ve spent two hours washing 361 back at the yard, only to find that I’d missed half of it when it dried. The guys at Northstar know what they’re doing though, they go around the truck and trailer with a flashlight before they let you go and if they spot any dirt, they wash it again, it’s not the quickest process, but perfection takes time. We can get the truck washed at other truckwashes, but I’m more than happy with the job they do at Northstar, so that’s where I spend the company’s money!

It’s taken me two and a half hours to drive to Fargo and I spent another hour in the wash bay, it’s now time I got me a latte, being in a big truck sometimes gets in the way of this and I have to find an alternative to my preferred Starbucks, luckily there’s a McD’s just across from the Flying J truckstop, so after feeding 361, I walk over and satisfy my craving for milky goodness. I get an extra one for the road and call into Subway and grab a sandwich too, as I’ve said before, there’s not a lot going on in this part of The World so I’m planning on pushing on until I get to my destination for the night, Miles City, Montana, that’s around 400miles away.

The run through North Dakota is easy enough, at this time of year anyway, in Winter I have lots of snow and wind to deal with, but today my only concern are the bugs and the setting sun. Heading west into the sunset can be a real headache; the sun takes forever to go down so it’s either reflecting back at me off the shiny hood of the truck or directly in my line of sight. I have engineered my own sun visors to compliment the ones in the truck, it sounds rather clever, but basically I place A4 envelopes along the bottom of the windshield to block the reflection from the hood and put on my Paul Brandt ball cap (available to order shortly) and pull the peak down to shield my eyes. A ‘drop visor’ would help reduce this problem too, I think it would also improve the appearance of 361; hopefully the Brandt Bros. will take pity on me and get me one.

I arrived at Miles City and parked in the Pilot truckstop, they’re now partnered with Flying J, in fact, they own Flying J, but continue to run the two brands side by side, the merger brought about many changes, the biggest one for me being that as Flying J was our preferred fuel supplier, I can now fuel in Pilots too, so I have a lot more choice in where I stop. Tonight that’s of no concern, all I’m doing is parking and resting my sun scorched eyes for the entire duration of my ten hour break.

As I’m on day two of a three day trip, I have no need to get up early, I don’t even bother with an alarm, some people may think that’s lazy, but as you can tell from my ramblings, I manage to put good miles under the bumper each month, so that’s not the case. In fact, I think it’s a very good way to do the job. My body doesn’t have an on/off switch, so it’s far less fatiguing to go to sleep and wake up when my body wants to do so. Research has shown that driving tired is as dangerous as driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol and I take the safety of myself and other road users very seriously, well that’s my story and I’m sticking to it!

Pilot truckstops also have McDonalds on site at lots of their locations, Miles City is one such place, so after my ablutions, they provided my morning Latte. I did my pre trip and hit the road, today was going to be a big day, the first part is easy going through the western edge of the Prairies, but the mountains loomed ahead soon after and it’s hard going until the southern tip of Idaho, my destination for the night will be the home of the Flying J truckstop chain (pre merger) in Ogden, Utah. First I had the small matter of a day’s work to do.

I had picked up I-94 at Fargo, this was to take me all the way to Billings, Montana, here it merges with the longest Interstate, I-90 which starts out in Boston and goes to Seattle. Miles City is 138miles from the merge and it takes just over two hours for I-94 to run its course. After joining I-90 at Billings, I have another two and a half hours running to get to Bozeman, here I pull off the Interstate at the intersection with US 191, fuel up 361 as Montana is a good place to buy fuel at the moment and take the back roads, I use 191 and US 287, it cuts a big corner, but even if it didn’t it would be worth the extra miles. The scenery here is some of the most spectacular I’ve seen, I’ve driven in quite a lot of countries too, so I don’t say that lightly. The road runs alongside the Yellowstone National Park and the views through my windshield have to be seen to be fully appreciated.

I touched on buying cheaper fuel in Montana, I’ve had some requests to explain how things work in that respect, and so I’ll do that now. To ensure that trucks pay their way and contribute to the Highway Fund that pays for roads and bridges in North America, there’s an agency called IFTA, the International Fuel Tax Association, they collect all the Fuel Tax and it goes into a central fund. Trucking companies have to pay a Tax based on the miles they cover in each State, they report this to IFTA and the Tax they’ve paid on Fuel goes towards the Road Use Tax. Now here’s the clever bit, each State has a different Fuel Tax rate, some are higher than others, but pump prices are not that far apart wherever you are in the country, so a $4 gallon of fuel can have a nett cost of $3:50 in one State, yet the nett cost can be $3:85 in the neighboring State, it all depends on the State Tax. Each State has a different Road Use Tax rate too, so the best way to do it is to buy fuel in the States with the highest Fuel Tax, this ensures that you don’t get a bill from IFTA at the end of the year and has the added benefit of making the nett cost of fuel cheaper.

Now I’ve got that out the way, you’ll see that there’s a lot more to this Trucking Game than meets the eye, it’s not all spectacular views and Starbucks you know! However, right now it is, I’ve got breathtaking scenery everywhere I look and down the road in Idaho Falls there’s a Starbucks waiting for me. I really enjoy the drive through here, as well as the natural scenery I get to go through a couple of genuine Cowboy Towns, the people wearing Stetsons around here are not doing it because they want to look cool, they do it because they’re the real McCoy. One town I pass through, Ennis, even has a Saloon Bar with Cowboys stood outside smoking, it doesn’t get more Wild West than that. There are also natural Hot springs alongside the highway, but unfortunately there’s nowhere to park a big truck, so I’ve yet to indulge, one day……

I like driving this road too, it’s a bit of a rollercoaster ride, with constant curves and steep grades, but I get a sense of achievement from keeping it all together and taking the correct line through the curves so that I can hustle along without fear of crossing the center line or my load shifting inside the trailer. I’m also constantly shifting through the 18 gears at my disposal to keep the mighty Pete on the boil and make good progress in the hills. The big 15liter CAT engine under the hood makes going up the mountain grades easy, the Jake Brake makes coming down easy. For those that don’t know, a Jake Brake is an auxiliary braking system fitted to most big trucks, it closes off the Exhaust Valves on the compression stroke, yet allows more air to enter on the intake stroke, this creates compression and slows down the engine. You’ll know when a truck is using its ‘Jakes’ as they make a sound like a machine gun through the exhaust stacks. 361 is especially loud as it has upgraded performance mufflers, because of the noise they (Jakes) make, a lot of Cities have a Noise Ordinance that prohibits their use. I find that a bit crazy, they are a very important safety feature, their use prevents the brakes from overheating, which can have really bad consequences, a truck with overheated brakes is a 40ton missile, far better to put up with a bit of noise than have a runaway truck in your living room, or better still, don’t buy a house next to a truck route if you don’t like trucks!

I know I’m safe having a little anti ‘anti truck’ rant, after all, if you don’t like trucks, this blog is hardly going to feature on your ‘must read’ list. Now, back to business. US 287 crosses into Idaho in the Targhee National Forest, it merges with US 20 and runs down through Cabin Country. During the Winter I hit a real bad snow storm here, the elevation meant that I was actually inside a snow cloud, visibility was next to zero and I was creeping down the road at 2mph in places, I couldn’t stop as there are no pull offs and it would’ve been too dangerous anyway, the zero visibility meant that nobody would’ve seen me until they crashed into me, so I kept going, it took me almost four hours to cover less than twenty miles, believe me I’ve never worked so hard for a pay check in my life! Today though it was much easier, the sun was shining and all was good in my world.

Before I knew it Starbucks was on the horizon, but first I had to pick up some groceries, I’m still on my healthy living campaign, I’m enjoying it too, a little ingenuity and a microwave allows me to prepare some decent meals. I try to stay away from tinned and preserved foods and I read labels. I’ve seen some good results too; my jeans are a little loose now. I also get some exercise as I walk around the store; this is part two of my healthy living regime. It’s very difficult to keep in shape when you’re out on the road, there’s also the weather to take into account, it’s too hot in Summer and far too cold in Winter, so I walk around a large Grocery Store, when I’m not shopping, I load the cart with bottles of water and walk around for an hour or so.

The groceries are stowed away, my exercise is done, my coffee cup is full of Starbucks’ finest, it’s now time to head off down the road again, compared to the last few hours, the next few are pretty easy, I’m heading south-west so the setting sun doesn’t cause as many problems as yesterday, I still want that drop visor though! Idaho soon becomes Utah, the Flying J at Ogden beckons, unfortunately I’m not the only one with this idea and as I pull into the parking lot I join the back of a line up. It’s a popular stopping point for trucks heading south to LA, it’s a full day’s drive away, so it’s the last stopping point for trucks heading that way, however a full parking lot isn’t the cause of the back up, someone has lost their trailer in the middle of the road. Obviously the driver never did a proper walk around check before he set off. The trailer is attached to the tractor unit by a king pin, this locks into a set of jaws on the 5th wheel, there’s a handle to release the jaws so that we can uncouple from a trailer, you should always check that it’s coupled properly when first hooking to a trailer, it’s a simple process. First of all you should make sure the 5th wheel and the trailer height match before backing under the trailer, this ensures that the king pin doesn’t sit on top of the jaws, this can create the impression that it’s all coupled ok, when it is not, a simple tug forwards before releasing the trailer brakes will tell you if this has happened. A fail safe is to get under the trailer and visually inspect the jaws have locked around the king pin. It takes 30secs and saves you from the kind of incident I witnessed. There are some really stupid people out there who will also ‘pull the pin’ as the uncoupling process is called; some of these people inhabit my world, so I always have a quick look before setting off.

For me the incident turns out to be a blessing in disguise, the parking lot is full, apart from one spot, which the unlucky driver just departed, with a deft bit of reversing, I back into the now empty hole and sit back watching the fun and games for a while. I also do a post trip walk around check, it makes sense to do this, it’s also law and while nobody checks that it’s done, Mike Hinchey, the Safety Director, would be sitting me on the naughty step if I called into the office in the morning with a problem I could’ve spotted and dealt with the night before. All is well, so I head off to the land of nod.

I wake up to a glorious day, I’m parked facing the mountains, rather than the flatness of the Salt Lake basin and it’s a good way to start any day. I head off for a shower and a shave, but I can only perform two of the three S’s this morning, there’s no Starbucks nearby. There is a McDs however, so I walk over to it for my Latte, the young lady at the register somehow remembers me from a previous visit and asks me if I want a Latte! Definitely not your stereotypical McDonalds employee. I ask her if she recognized me from my accent, thinking maybe it was really my charm and good looks, but she said ‘No, it’s your Mr. Messy T shirt’ Oh well, at least I got my Latte without waiting too long.

Time to cover the first miles of a big day, the rush hour madness of Salt Lake City has passed, so apart from a stretch of construction with a reduced speed limit, it’s hammer down for the remaining 343miles of Utah, the scenery is nice, there are snow capped mountains to my left, but the road ahead is flat and empty, in less than 5hours I’m swapping Utah for Arizona. I’m only cutting a corner of the State through the Virgin River Canyon and the Welcome to Nevada sign is soon looming through my windshield. Las Vegas is only a couple of hours down the road, the desert sun is warming things up nicely, it would be a good time to pop into Sin City and blow the froth off a few cold ones, but today is all about work, there’s no time to play. Well that’s not strictly true, many years ago I had a model Peterbilt tractor trailer that I used to push around the floor, now I’m all grown up I do the same, except I now have a full size model and the imaginary world of my kitchen is now the North American Continent.

I top off the tanks in Las Vegas, it’s that IFTA thing again, and the fact that I’m now able to get a Starbucks has nothing to do with my stop…..honest. From Vegas it’s a half hour run to the California line, the Welcome to California sign is my favorite sign of all, at least until I find one that says ‘Get your free money here’ It’s also the start of a really long pull up to Halloran Summit, the big CAT under the hood flexes its muscles here and makes light work of the climb, the only trucks that pass me are ones that are empty, I do enjoy romping past other trucks as they struggle up hills, I have a bit of banter with another driver on the CB radio and tell him that his painfully slow truck may grow up to be a Peterbilt if he’s lucky. The aforementioned Jake Brake helps me keep to the 55mph speed limit down the other side as I enter Baker, home of the World’s Largest Thermometer, it doesn’t seem to work anymore, but the sun has dropped below the horizon now, so it has cooled off a bit from the heat of the afternoon.

From Baker I have another couple of big climbs before dropping down into The City of Angels; I’m running tight on time, so my late arrival is necessary, the heavy traffic of the daylight hours would mean I would’ve had to stop long before the log book called time on me. Land is at a premium around here, so truckstops are thin on the ground, the huge population need a lot of goodies delivered, lots of trucks and not a lot of parking means that it’s too much of a risk to run into Shaky Town when you’re running close to the end of the 11hr daily driving limit, if you can’t park, you’re forced to run on the road illegally, if the CHP catch you, the Safety Director’s naughty step is the least of your worries, the same applies if you get stuck in a traffic back up, when the log book says you must stop, it’s an instruction, not a request. I’ve planned things so that I can make my destination without fear of traffic or falling foul of the law, I’m parking at the receiver too, so overcrowded truckstops are not an issue either. It doesn’t always work this way, but security is also an issue, LA is a high crime area, the receiver knows this and allows parking on site to ensure that their product goes into their warehouse and nobody else’s.

Some of the stuff we haul is of a sensitive nature, our customers may not want the many ‘millions’ of blog fans to know the nature of their business, so I can’t go into details of what we haul or the people we haul it to and from, but it’s not Gold Bars or Diamonds, that much I can say! Whatever it was that was in my trailer is now on the loading dock, my trailer is empty, but not for long, I’m on my way across the city to my pick up, but first I have to go to Starbucks, have to get my priorities right! My pick up is not until late afternoon, although I was booked to unload first thing in the morning, you never know what problems can arise, so dispatch leave room for some margin of error, sometimes I need every minute, other times, like today, it gives me time to relax for a few hours. I choose to relax by driving along the Pacific Coast Highway and finding a convenient parking place within walking distance of a Starbucks. I take my Latte down to the beach and watch the world go by for an hour or two, before going to my pick up.

Even by my standards, it’s quite late in the day when I’m ready to roll again; I used the downtime wisely and walked to a local grocery store to buy some fresh fruit. California is known as the Salad Bowl of America and the varieties on offer are unique to the area, most of it was hanging from a tree the day before and you can taste the difference from stuff that has been sitting in a cold store and on the back of a refrigerated truck for a few days. Of course, all fruit is good for you, but fresh is definitely the best tasting.

I can’t get to my delivery point in Edmonton in two days, yet I don’t need three full days, so I can either, have three easy days, or an easy day today and follow it up with two big days. Because of my late afternoon departure, I take the second option and decide to run as far as Las Vegas tonight. I haven’t stopped off here for a while, so it’s time I reacquainted myself with one of my favorite cities in The World, I might even hit the jackpot while I’m there.

It takes about four and a half hours to get to Vegas from LA, there’s not an easy mile between them, you’re either going up or down a big hill, it certainly takes it out of a truck to pull a heavy load on this road, especially in the warmer months, the cooling system is working to capacity and if there are any weak points, you’ll soon discover them, today I made such a discovery. 361 was running a higher than usual temperature, but it wasn’t a mechanical issue, it was not getting enough air through the radiator because it was blocked by bugs, as you can imagine, during the course of an 11hr driving day, I run into quite a few insects, the grille of the truck has to have openings in it to allow airflow to cool the radiator and engine, lots of bugs get through these openings, but they don’t get far, they usually hit the radiator and collect there. I sweep them off whenever I pop the hood to clean my windshield, but too many get wedged between the cores of the radiator. The guys at the shop separate all the components at the front of the engine and pressure wash all the bugs away, this usually gets done Mid-Summer, but this year the bugs have overwhelmed the radiator before we got the chance to do this, it must be all the runs I get to the sunshine during the Winter Months, you can see from the photograph below, just how many bugs hit the front of poor old 361.

It doesn’t cause me any problems as such, but it’s something that needs attention sooner, rather than later, or it could get to the point where the engine overheats and that has the potential to ruin my day. I put this to the back of my mind now though, Sin City awaits. I park at the Wild Wild West Truckstop off Tropicana Avenue and walk to The Strip, first stop is, of course, In and Out Burgers, these are the best burgers in America, by far, I know, I’m supposed to be eating healthy, but the odd guilty pleasure won’t do much harm and it’s only a diet, not a law.

I spend a few hours on The Strip, I never managed to hit the big one, but that’s a blessing in disguise really, I’d only retire to a Caribbean Island and spend the rest of my days sailing my yacht, driving my Lamborghini or sitting on the beach, drinking cold beer. I don’t think it would be nearly as much fun as trucking around North America, but it wouldn’t hurt to find out, so I could compare the two lifestyles, I like to keep an open mind, you never know, the rich playboy lifestyle may be fun after all.

The following morning I have a little devil on both shoulders, they’re whispering ‘In and Out Burger’ in both my ears, but with all the willpower I can muster, I ignore them and have a bowl of Rice Krispies instead, I do however walk over to Starbucks and grab a Latte, I’m only human after all, I always have a Skinny Latte, so my Starbucks addiction doesn’t have a negative effect on my waistline, on my pocket, yes, it’s an indulgence for sure, but I work hard, so a few luxuries are more than justified.

The run up to Salt Lake City is hard work for the first few hundred miles, today it’s harder than usual, the bugs in the radiator are making things a little warm under the hood, not to the point where the engine overheats, but it’s something that needs attention before I get back to the yard. I call the office and Kenny Siemens, our Shop Foreman books me into the Peterbilt Dealership in Salt Lake City, better to be safe than sorry. It doesn’t take too long for the mechanics to strip down the Air Conditioning Condenser and the Charge Air Cooler which are positioned in front of the Radiator, they then power wash them and I’m shocked at the amount of bugs they get out, it’s a wonder there was any airflow through the radiator at all. I advise Kenny and he suggests getting an exterior Bug Screen to supplement the factory fitted one behind the grille, as you can see, these attach to the outside of the grille and being a finer mesh than the factory one, it should prevent this from happening again. I’m in two minds about the new look it gives 361, I like the big Peterbilt emblem and being black, it matches the color scheme on the truck, but I prefer the look of the naked grille, it’ll grow on me I guess.

I’ve got time to make up now, I need to get to Dillon, Montana to be within striking distance of my delivery point in Edmonton the following evening, so I have no time for indulging in a Starbucks or the last remaining In and Out Burger joint that I pass on this trip, I guess that’s why they call it work. 361 is performing well, the now clear radiator is doing its job and keeping things nice and cool as I climb the hills in the southern tip of Idaho. I blast past Idaho Falls with the promise that I’ll return to my beloved Coffee Shop the next time I pass by. I stop for the night at a small truckstop and go straight to bed; tomorrow will be a long, hard day.

I wake up early today, through choice, as I said, it’s going to be a long day, I don’t want to be running too late, I have to make my delivery before booking off for the night and that can take up to an hour, that takes a valuable hour from my 14hr day. First I have to fax off my documents to the Custom’s Broker so they can arrange my Custom’s Clearance into Canada, I do this and call the Broker to make sure they have everything they need and that the fax is legible, it’s all good, so I hit the road. This part of I-15 is unlike the perceived image of an Interstate, I doubt there’s a straight stretch of more than a couple of miles along its entire length in the State. The terrain is mountainous too, so 361 has to work hard, but it takes it all in its stride.

The fuel tanks are getting low, I’m back in Montana, and so I run as far as I can to take advantage of the cheaper fuel costs here. I pull into the Flying J at Great Falls and top off with fuel, I also fill the tank on the trailer, I’m dropping it in Edmonton and the customer quite often loads trailers a couple of days before they’re dispatched. With a full tank there’s no possibility of it running dry, it also means that the next driver doesn’t have to mess around fueling the trailer up when he collects it, if only every driver did that, mentioning no names! I also make myself some dinner and have a shower.

I’m on the road again in under an hour, so I’m still on schedule to make Edmonton this evening. The broker had worked their magic and my load was cleared, all that was left to do now was the last 120ish miles to the border and from there, a few more hours and I would be in Edmonton. Then came the bad news, dispatch called me to advise me that the receiver didn’t want their load until the following morning, so my early start was in vain. As it turned out it wouldn’t have too much of an impact on things, I was only going to go to bed after unloading anyway, my next job was to collect a preloaded trailer from the same customer, that wasn’t ready until the next day anyway, in reality the only downside was that I had bypassed Starbucks the day before in an attempt to remain on schedule, oh well, that’s life.

The crossing into Canada was quick, I ran over the DOT scale just inside Canada without a problem and made my way North, as I was now in Canada I get an extra two hours on my daily driving limit, but I still had no spare time, so I took my favored route bypassing Calgary and stopped at Airdrie to get two Lattes from Starbucks to make up for yesterday’s abstinence. A little more than a couple of hours later I was parked at the receiver, ready to unload the following morning.

My trailer empty, I dropped it and hooked to my next one, this was going straight back to the yard in Morris. This is the longest leg of the whole trip, but thanks to the 13hrs driving that we’re allowed to do in Canada, I still make it back in one day, I usually split this journey up when I’m heading west, I can cope with the long day ok, but it’s far easier to do it in two hits and easier is my middle name! No such thoughts today though, I’m heading east and that takes me home, it’s been a good week, sure there’s been ups and downs, but nothing that couldn’t be put right, the customers all got their goods when they wanted them and in good condition, I’ve got some good miles in, I’ve been to California, had a night off in Las Vegas, so all things considered, I’m happy. I’m heading home now too, so I’ll be spending some time with my family before doing it all again next week.

I’ll be heading for the beach again, this time on the East Coast, stay tuned for the full story…..

As the title suggests, this is no ordinary trip, in fact it’s not a single trip, but a whole month’s work all rolled into one diary. I’m lucky that our operation and our location allow me to reach the far corners of North America and return home in a week’s work, as you’ll see from the rest of the story, I’m also lucky enough to go to some wonderful destinations.

The trip starts in the yard at Morris, in geographical terms this is located around 30kms from the Longitudinal Center of Canada, basically right on the centerline of North America. I’m heading for the East Coast first, destination Massachusetts, from there I go to Connecticut for my reload back to Canada, this fills my log book, so I take a couple of days off and head off to the coast again, this time the West Coast and to California. From there I reload for Edmonton and then once I have that unloaded, I switch trailers and head back to Winnipeg, drop the trailer and bobtail back to the yard, the book is full again, so another couple of days at home is called for. Refreshed and relaxed after a long weekend at home I then head back to the East Coast again, this time to Virginia Beach, from there I have a run up the East Coast to just south of Boston with a stop in Maryland on the way through, then back to the yard again for a couple of days at home, before going out to Alberta again to load for the Gulf Coast of Texas, once that is unloaded, I reload and head for the yard with just over 15000miles covered.

Now 15000miles sounds like a heck of a lot of miles to cover in a month, for the average motorist it probably is, but I do this week in and week out and have done all my working life, it’s not as difficult as it seems. It isn’t easy, not at all, but with proper planning, both on my part and from the office, it is all in a day’s work, well a month’s work actually, but nobody really says that, maybe I should start a new cliché.

As usual the first day starts at a civilized hour, the run from my house to the yard takes about an hour, so after loading my car, I say my goodbyes and head off to start work. At the yard I couple up to my trailer and do my pre trip inspection, this takes 15minutes and basically involves checking the roadworthiness of the truck, it’s academic really as the boys in the shop have been all over 361 while I’ve been at home, as most of my trips take up a whole week, my truck goes into the shop for an inspection and grease job after every trip, any defects I have while I’m on the road are taken care of during this time, unless of course they require immediate attention. The guys in the shop do a very good job and they really look after me, quite often they will upgrade things or add something shiny. This time it was a routine visit and as well as the grease job, I had new fluids too, so with fresh oil, I fired up 361 and filled in my log book.

Although it was approaching lunch time, I still planned to get a big day done, so I put all my stuff in its place, OCD means that there is a home for everything in my cab, anyone who has been in my truck will testify that it freaks me out to have stuff scattered around the cab, my justification for this is that in the event of an accident, or the bumpy roads of Minnesota, I will not be hit by anything flying around in the cab, that’s true to a degree, but really it’s just because I’m a little bit weird about tidiness.

I had a van trailer this trip, one of our black ones, they look real good behind the truck and because of my OCD I try whenever possible to get one behind me, as I had loaded the trailer in Alberta, I had a choice of empty trailers to load, obviously I picked a black one.

Color coordinated to my satisfaction, I made for the border at Emerson/Pembina, it was not busy and I was in the Gastrack at Pembina running over the CAT Scale less than half an hour after leaving the yard, my weight was all in the correct places, so I set off down I-29 for Fargo and the day’s first Latte, it’s only a two hour run down to Fargo thanks to the 75mph speed limit, being in the Prairies means that there are no hills to slow me down and there is no traffic to speak of, so it was hammer down all the way. It’s a nice way to settle into a trip, if I’m running West it prepares me for the emptiness of the open roads I’m going to be travelling down for the next few days, if, like this trip, I’m heading East, it gives me a break before I have to contend with the madness that starts in the Twin Cities and, after a four hour let off through Wisconsin, continues all the way until I hit the Atlantic Ocean.

The coffee monster inside me has been fed, so I start heading east along I-94 and cross the line into Minnesota, the scale is open and I get called in, but I get a bypass and roll straight through at 25mph without a care in the world. The DOT in Minnesota have a pretty good policy, you never know if they’re going to be open or not, obviously as close as it is to the yard my driving hours will never be wrong and after a visit to the shop, my truck will be in tip top condition, but for anyone running through here from further away, you would need your head examined if you attempted to cross into Minnesota with a truck in poor condition or a log book that wasn’t correct, I’m sure most drivers are aware of this and it must contribute to keeping the roads safer, which is exactly what the DOT are trying to do.

After the scale, it’s a three hour 70mph blast across the eastern edge of the High Plains, agriculture is big business here and the skyline is dominated by Grain Elevators, they’re quiet at this time of year, the farmers are back from their Holiday Homes in Florida and planting the seeds for their next harvest, the flooding has all receded now, so the fields are full of Farm Equipment and the highways are empty, so it only takes me three hours to cover the first 207miles of the state. The next hour is not as easy as the first ones, East of Rogers and the 207 mile marker is where the Twin City Chaos starts, Minneapolis and St Paul are consistently in the top five cities for road rage incidents, spend a few minutes driving around and you will see why, the view through my windshield is almost like a speeded up version of a drive through most cities, the natives weave from lane to lane, it seems as if they are all intent on being first to get to their destination. They make the Italians seem tame in comparison and having spent many years driving around in Italy I thought I’d seen the craziest drivers in the world, how wrong I was!

I may sound as if I’m complaining about the run around the ‘Twins’ but I actually enjoy it, all the way around you have to have total concentration, it gets the adrenalin coursing through my veins and before I know it I’m crossing the St Croix river into Wisconsin. This is one of my favorite States, it’s very picturesque with its forests and there are a few small hills too, it really highlights the four seasons and at the start of summer it’s very lush and green, quite a contrast from the ploughed fields of Manitoba, North Dakota and Minnesota, it’s also home to a McDonalds a mere nineteen miles over the State Line, the last hour has taken its toll on my caffeine level, so I top it up and take an hour to have some supper. My new healthy diet means that I swap my usual burger and fries for something from my in cab fridge, tonight’s culinary delight consists of a Tuna Salad, to which I add some chopped onion and Sweet corn, along with a healthy squirt of fat free Chipotle Sauce, it does the job, I hit the road again feeling full and feeling good about my new healthy outlook on life.

As I’m heading east I get to see the sun getting lower in my mirrors and soon it’s dark outside, this presents a few challenges for us Night Owls, the first is the four wheelers who have no consideration for anybody else on the road and drive with their high beams on, this really drives me crazy, I understand that it’s dark out and harder to see, but it’s even harder when you have someone coming towards you blinding you with their lights. The second challenge is the wildlife, Wisconsin has a huge Deer population, they like to munch on the foliage at the side of the road and can’t seem to make up their minds which side of the road they want to dine at, so they’re frequently crossing the road, far too many of them don’t make it and there are carcasses along the shoulder every couple of hundred yards. They are quite solid creatures too so hitting them will do a fair bit of damage, so far I’ve been lucky enough to avoid them for a while, tonight was no different thankfully and I was soon approaching the end of my shift, south of State Capitol, Madison and a few miles north of the Illinois State Line. It had been a long day for sure, but it would make my life a lot easier over the next few days, so I went to bed satisfied with my work.

Day two starts with the obligatory Latte, while it was cooling off I did my pre trip inspection, all was well, so I set off to the Flying J truckstop at South Beloit for some fuel, a friend and I are in the middle of a debate in how to pronounce the name of this place, he will be surprised to see that we’re still in the middle of the debate as he thinks he has the answer, he says the final T is a silent letter, I say it isn’t, we’ve both asked local people and both of us have had different answers, I’m yet to find someone who disagrees with me, except my friend and he’s from Wales, so what does he know!

I had a shower while I was at the truckstop, I had another big day ahead, but the small matter of Chicagoland had to be navigated first, while the driving is a little better than the Twin Cities, there are far more people on the roads, so careful planning is required or you can double or even treble the time taken to get from one side to the other, I would be on the tail end of the morning rush if I left straight after fuelling, so a leisurely start would prove to be more productive than hitting the road as soon as I could. My strategy worked out just fine and I had no hold ups at all, I ran in on I-90 as far as O’Hare Airport, where I branched south onto the I-294 which took me down to I-80, where I turned east again, a few miles west of the Illinois/Indiana line I-80 merges with I-90 again and I would stay on this road almost all the way to my destination.

Into Indiana, the self proclaimed Crossroads of America, the first few miles are free, the remainder of I-80/90 is known as The Indiana Toll Road, here I experience the first problem of the trip. Nothing too dramatic, but for some strange reason, the EZ Pass readers at the tollbooths in Indiana do not pick up the signal from the unit in my truck, this only happens in Indiana, every other toll booth in America can read it, but not it seems Indiana, the problem is compounded by the lack of staff in the toll booths, last year they went automatic and now you have to push a button and wait for an attendant to answer the intercom. The process then is to read out the serial number on the back of the EZ Pass, my English accent often causes problems here and I get quite frustrated with this, so much so that I never run down the Skyway from Central Chicago into Indiana anymore, this way can be much quicker and you run right through the middle of Chicago and get to see the sights along the way, but the toll booths on the Indiana side are a real pain, so I avoid them as much as possible, they may save a few bucks with their new automated system, but they lose the revenue from truck 361!

I’m planning on making it as far as Buffalo, New York today, the difficult bit has been done, so now it’s just an easy ride along the Interstate, it’s level ground all the way through Indiana and I’m soon shouting at the intercom at the eastern end of the Toll Road, I manage to make myself understood eventually and make my way into Ohio, this section of I-80/90 is also a toll road, but they call this one The Ohio Turnpike, I prefer it to its opposite number in Indiana for the simple reason, the EZ Pass readers work every time! The construction season is well under way in Ohio and it seems that as soon as I settle back into a nice cruise, I’m having to slow for a Construction Zone, it may be an inconvenience, but the work they’re doing is well overdue, the fact that it’s a toll road and we’re paying a lot of money to use it means that there are no excuses for letting it go to rack and ruin, to be fair they do a pretty good job of keeping it smooth, but as with any large organization with a budget, sometimes they seem to be doing work for the sake of doing work, or spending the budget.

One other thing I like about the Ohio Turnpike is that the Service Plazas are first class, they have free showers for truck drivers, ample parking, the food choices are pretty good too, there are the usual fast food joints, but there are other options too, fancy soups and sandwiches, Chinese or Italian food, but best of all, Starbucks, I haven’t had a latte for two states, so I pull in to sort that out, while I’m there I take the opportunity to sample some of the fancy soup on offer, a large bowl of Tomato, Basil and some Artisan Bread hits the spot and with my to go Latte in hand I head back out to 361 and do a walk around check, I do this every time I stop, just a quick walk around is all that’s needed, it’s a good way of spotting things that may cause a problem later on if left alone, so a quick check of the tires, lug nuts and to see if any fluids are leaking is standard practice every time I set off again.

I follow the Ohio Turnpike until Cleveland, the birthplace of Rock and Roll, it’s also home to some large Car Manufacturing Plants, they’re still operational, but a shadow of their former self, the local people have sure seen some changes in the landscape, from huge Car Factories employing tens of thousands to what they have now, Retail Parks, full of stores selling stuff that far too many locals cannot buy because their jobs went when they knocked down the factories to build the stores, but that’s progress and moving with the times for you. A lot of our work is moving foodstuffs around, we also move some raw materials, but the vast majority of trucks on the roads of North America are hauling finished product consumer goods around, most of the manufacturing today is done overseas, I can’t see how it works personally, judging by the recent economic woes, it doesn’t. Sorry to go off on a tangent, but I drive through these towns and cities and to see empty factories rotting away is a depressing sight. In past times they would’ve been a hive of activity, thousands of people would be employed there, there would be a constant stream of trucks going in and out, now they’re just Ghost Towns and this part of the world is now known as The Rust Belt, that’s sad……

The southern shore of Lake Erie is to my left as I head North East, The Great Lakes have their own weather system and today they’re bringing rain to that corner of Ohio, it seems to be a localized shower though because the first thing I do as I cross the line into Pennsylvania is switch off my windshield wipers, this part of PA is, due to its location on the shore of the lake, nice and flat, every other part of the state is either at the top of a hill or the bottom, it’s like a hilly version of Wisconsin really and is a very beautiful place, on this leg of the journey I’m only in the state for a brief time and then I’m enter The Empire State, my destination for the night is not far away now and I run the last hour or so to a Service Plaza before shutting down for the night, today had been a reasonably easy day and I relaxed for an hour reading my book before doing a nine hour internal inspection of my eyelids.

A new day dawns, well it dawned a few hours ago really, but I missed it due to a complete lack of interest in early mornings. Lavazza was the provider of my morning Latte and after my pre trip inspection I head out to put some miles under the bumper, I head up through the Seneca Nation on the New York Thruway, yet another toll road, this accepts my EZ Pass too, so apart from slowing for the toll booths it doesn’t cost me any time, it costs money though, but again they’re spending it wisely and making improvements and repairs to the road, my customary late start means that I get no hold ups in the construction zones, so I’m all for them, ask me after a 2hr back up though and you’ll get a completely different answer!

Buffalo looms in my windshield and then in no time it appears in my mirrors, it’s level running now and Rochester comes and goes, traffic is light and the miles are being eaten up, I’m cruising along at a steady 65mph and listening to the radio, I have a Sirius Satellite System installed in 361 and it has a wide variety of station choices, today I’m listening to Classic Vinyl and my cruise has a soundtrack by Pink Floyd, Creedence Clearwater Revival and Fleetwood Mac among others, fortunately this blog has no audio, as I was singing along and, trust me, singing is not one of my strengths, I do know all the words though so I can lip-sync just as good as Brittany Spears, however she has the edge on good looks, although that’s down to make up, well that’s my story and I’m sticking to it!

The Finger Lakes region soon replaces the Great Lakes and I pass through Syracuse, the topography changes after that, it becomes more hilly and you see rock outcrops here and there, the interstate then follows the Erie Canal and with the Adirondacks to the north I drop down into Albany, the State Capitol, that always struck me as strange, New York City is one of the most famous cities in the world, it’s in New York State and yet they have their State Government in Albany, not to take anything away from Albany, it’s a nice place, nestled on the banks of The Hudson River it’s quite picturesque, but it’s not New York City, that’s a good thing too today, I’ve managed to get an evening appointment for my delivery, New York City traffic would make that an impossible target. From Albany it’s a short distance to Massachusetts, maybe that’s the reason Albany was chosen as State Capitol, a long ago feud with the, Bay Stater, Massachusite, Massachusian, Massachusettser, Massachusetter, Massachusettean, these are the names Google came up with for natives of the State, whatever they call themselves, they have a nice place to live in, this is New England proper and the scenery is beautiful, rolling hills, lots of trees and small rivers, as an Old Englander I really feel comfortable here, a lot of the towns I pass through are named after English towns, so it’s almost a home away from home.

Massachusetts does have a bad side though, it seems they don’t like trucks, they have hardly any truckstops and places that are truck friendly in most other parts of the country have big No Trucks signs outside, every cloud has a silver lining though and they do have a Dunkin Donuts on every corner, I’m not a big fan of the donuts, well I am, but not during my healthy living chapter, I do however, love their coffee, as long as I can get a decent latte I’ll put up with most things, so if they don’t want me parking in their parking lots and spending my money, that’s fine, as long as I can get to a Dunkin Donuts a couple of times a day.

I had a couple of hours running along yet another toll road, this time The Mass Pike, not a big fish as the name suggests, this is the name for this section of I-90, it’s relatively smooth running and it’s the first time I’ve driven along it, in this direction anyway, I’ve been on the opposite side, but never headed east before. I followed it as far as Worcester, another English town and the original is home to the sauce that bears its name, I do like to hear people trying to pronounce this word, it’s pronounced worster, well kind of and the sauce is pronounced worstersheer, as well as adding it to a Bloody Mary it also makes Cheese on Toast, or Grilled Cheese as it’s called over here, it tastes delicious, whatever it’s called, but you need to use a good strong mature Cheddar to make decent Cheese on Toast, slices of Cheese flavored yellow plastic are just wrong.

From Worcester it was a short run north to Leominster and my delivery point, Leominster is another English town, again it’s pronounced totally different from its spelling and the correct pronunciation is Lemster, why they decided to add all the extra letters is beyond me, if it’s pronounced Lemster then it should be spelt Lemster, but what do I know?

As luck would have it there was a DD a short walk away from my delivery so I took full advantage and had a stroll up there as my trailer was emptied, I returned with a Latte in hand just as they finished, my plan was coming together nicely, I had just enough hours to get within striking distance of my reloading point in Durham, Connecticut, Durham is another English town and surprise surprise it’s not pronounced as it’s spelt, we English pronounce it Durum rather than Der Ham, I’m glad I learned English as a first language because it sure is a complicated way of communicating!

I had done a Google search for the address of my reload, I have the mapping programme that I use for my maps on here, it’s useful for route planning, but it has limitations, so if I’m heading into the unknown I like to check it out on Google maps too, this makes sure that there are no unexpected low bridges or other non truck friendly things to catch me out, I discover that my pick up is in the middle of the historic town of Durham and that I cannot park outside, so I plan to stop at the edge of town and make my way into the factory in daylight hours, the fact that my chosen parking place was adjacent to a Dunkin Donuts is purely coincidental! I spent an hour or so reading my book, before settling down for some much needed beauty sleep, I wasn’t particularly tired, but boy do I need the beauty part!

With a Latte in hand I made my way to my pick up, I was allocated a dock straight away and got talking to another driver while my trailer was being loaded, the other driver was a local guy and we started to talk about our relative jobs, as you can guess, I’m very happy at Paul Brandt Trucking, the other guy was also over the road, but being American he can run wild all over the country, I can only go between Canada and the USA and vice versa, Canadian trucks cannot do internal deliveries within the lower 48 and the US trucks cannot do internal deliveries within Canada. This means that I have a much better deal, I go out and back in a week, have some home time and then do it all again, my new friend could end up running out west, then load for the south, back out west again etc, it could be many weeks before he gets a load that takes him home. He was also driving an old Volvo, so he was a bit jealous of my truck too, he couldn’t believe that it was a company truck, I quite often get that response from other drivers. There’s a saying in trucking, there are two kinds of driver, those that drive a Peterbilt and those that wish they did….

I soon had to say goodbye to my new friend and start the long journey home, I had never travelled on this road before and I’m sure glad I got the opportunity, New England is a beautiful place, as someone who spent the first forty years of their life in the original England, I have to say that the new version is a big improvement. The locals can even understand me and not one of them asked if I was Australian! As you can see from the map, I travelled back into New York on I-84, it’s in The Catskills area and as I said, it’s very picturesque. Soon after crossing into NY I passed the showroom of Orange County Choppers, I have visited here before and recommend it to anyone who goes out that way, all the show bikes they make for the TV show are on display and you get to see them filming the show if you’re lucky. The stars of the show are there most days, the last time I was there I bumped into Paul Snr, he’s the big guy and on TV he looks quite scary, I’ve seen him in real life and I reckon I could take him in an arm wrestling contest!

I only cut a corner of New York going this way, so I’m soon in PA again, I hit Scranton and head south for I-80, this part of it is free, for now, the previous Governor was trying to get it tolled, but he was unsuccessful, fortunately. The journey through PA is, as I said, a hilly version of Wisconsin, but busier, it’s the main route through to the New York City area from the Mid West and the West Coast, if you were a truck spotter it would be the place to be, it’s a non stop stream of trucks, but it’s not congested, so there’s plenty to keep me occupied, but not too much that I’m in traffic, just the way I like it. I stop for some lunch close to the city of State College and finish off with a Latte to go.

After my lunch break I have a few more miles to cover, I only need to get into Ohio to be able to make it back to base in two shifts, but the more I do today, the earlier I get home, with my customary tardy approach to getting out of bed, a full shift for me seldom ends at a civilized hour. Getting as much done as possible in a day also allows me a bit more flexibility over the next two days and if the unexpected happens, as it often does, I can still remain on schedule. The load I have on is going to Alberta and the guys in dispatch will already be planning the next leg of this load and my next trip, so a small hold up for me could bring down the whole house of cards. It may seem a simple thing, this trucking business, but you’d be amazed at the work that goes on behind the scenes, having sampled most aspects of it, I would say that my part in the chain is far less stressful than the others, I just point 361 towards my destination and sit back and enjoy the scenery, the most challenging thing for my mind today is where to stop for the night, my criteria for any overnight stop is accessibility to good coffee in the morning, I have just the place in mind, so that’s where I’m heading.

Before stopping for the night I leave behind Pennsylvania and re-enter Ohio and its turnpike, I bypass Cleveland. This is where I-80/I-90 split up or merge, depending on your direction, I’m westbound, so it’s a merge for me, I’m retracing my outbound steps now, so what was on my left a few days ago is now on my right, what was on my right is on my left, what was behind is in front and what was in front is now behind, but none of this matters to me, it’s night, so it’s dark and it all looks the same! Luckily there are plenty of lights in the service plaza, there’s also plenty of parking spots, so I pull into one, get my stuff together and take advantage of the free showers in the Driver’s Lounge, they also have laundry facilities and a TV area, it’s good that the Turnpike Authority does this, truckstops are few and far between alongside the toll road, without the Service Plazas it would be very difficult to find somewhere to take a break anywhere in Ohio or Indiana.

I get out of bed at the crack of mid morning, no morning rush to avoid in these parts, but I will have to navigate my way through Chicagoland this afternoon, I’ve tried going through early afternoon to miss the madness, but so far I’ve never managed it, I think that the whole area is a mess from 7am to 7pm, so I elect to run through in the early evening, so far it’s worked for me. I just have the small matter of half of Ohio and the breadth of Indiana to deal with first, so after my pre trip and Starbucks, I hit the road, set the cruise to 65mph and continue putting homeward bound miles under the bumper. Not a lot to see in this part of the world, so I amuse myself listening to the trucking channel on Sirius Radio, in the mornings there’s a talk show hosted by a couple of New Yorkers, to understand what it is about you’d have to listen to the show, mere words cannot describe the mayhem that comes from my speakers, I love it though, if I miss the morning show I usually listen to the replay in the evenings. I met one of the hosts, Meredith Ochs at last year’s Dallas Truckshow, with co-host Chris T; they hit most of the major truckshows and have really become passionate about trucking. Back in Britain there is nothing like this, there are radio shows of course, but nothing dedicated to drivers. When you think about it, it makes a lot of sense, of all the occupations, truck drivers have the biggest opportunity to listen to the radio; a show that targets them is a good business model.
A sea of brake lights confronts me as I approach the Indiana-Illinois state line, fortunately it’s not a taste of things to come, but a slight back up due to construction, it doesn’t take too long before it all gets moving again, I’m no fan of congestion, but coming from England it’s not a new phenomenon to me, a lot of truckers don’t like going to the East Coast or LA because of the traffic, but for me it’s not a big issue, in Britain congestion is far worse than anything Chicagoland can through at me, I dealt with that for my 20yrs of trucking over there, so a half hour back up is a piece of cake, especially when I had the foresight to pop into Starbucks and get a piece of delicious Lemon Ice Pound Cake to go with my latte, all around me were getting hot under the collar, while I was totally chilled out with coffee and cake, how very British of me. I had also had some Chinese Food; I don’t want to be accused of being a Xenophobe.

I elected to bypass the Windy City again, it can be busy in the evenings if there are events going on in the area, there’s a whole bunch of things that go on along the Lake Shore and if the White Sox, Bears or Cubs are playing the roads soon jam up, I want to make tomorrow an easyish day, so want to get as far into Wisconsin as possible before I introduce myself to my pillow again.

I-294 serves its purpose and soon I’m on I-90 with the worst of the traffic behind me, for now. I have a big construction zone in front of me. They’re rebuilding the interstate, the signs say that the current road is 50yrs old, so that would make it one of the first of General Eisenhower’s interstates. Modeled on the German Autobahn Network and built soon after the Second World War, their purpose was threefold, firstly they allowed fast, safe and comfortable travel throughout America, secondly they put Americans back at work and boosted the economy and thirdly, but possibly most important in the General’s mind, they’re of strategic military importance, a lot of east-west and north-south Interstate intersections are close to major Military Bases, this allows fast and efficient movement of troops and equipment should the need ever arise. It wasn’t needed today, which was good, the lanes are a little narrow and sharing the limited space with crazy car drivers is bad enough, a Tank Commander in a hurry would be something else altogether!

I breezed through at the posted limit and was soon crossing into Wisconsin, my day had gone smoothly and I had a little more time than I had anticipated, so I pushed on until the log book called time on the day’s excitement. Black River Falls is where I’m laying my hat this evening, it’s time to feed 361 again so I can combine fuelling with my pre-trip inspection in the morning, I’m also going to scrape some of the wildlife from my windshield as during the evening I had picked up a load of bugs, but that can wait, my main priority now was sleep, so that’s exactly what I did.

The last day of this trip starts earlier than is customary for me, I have a nine hour drive in front of me before I reach the yard, I then have to do my trip paperwork, empty the cab, load up my car and travel another hour back to the house. I love my life out on the road, I get the opportunity to visit places and see sights that others can only dream of, but there’s no place like home, so I’m on a mission. 361 gets fed, pre-trip is done and I’m on the road as soon as possible, you’re probably wondering about my morning coffee, but don’t, Ronny McD had taken care of business for me, so all was good in my world.

Wisconsin soon turned into Minnesota and I passed over the DOT scale as I entered my penultimate state of the trip, all was well and I was soon mingling with the locals on the I-694 Northern Bypass of the Twin Cities. Good planning on my part had ensured that traffic was light, but it’s never easy around here, I’m sure most of them get their driver’s license from a pack of Rice Krispies! From here on it’s an easy ride through the rest of the state, I set the cruise and each passing mile gets me closer to home. I cross into North Dakota at Fargo and head north on I-29 for the border, it’s a just over two hour run and it passes without incident. I call the Customs Broker to check that my load has been cleared to cross into Canada; it has, so apart from a brief stop for my Latte, I push on.

No problems with my load, so after a brief stop at the border I’m soon putting the last half hour of the trip behind me and I pull into the yard. The trailer is parked, paperwork is done, my stuff has been transshipped from 361 to my car and I’m at home and in front of the TV an hour later, another week’s work done. The mechanics have the next couple of days to tend to 361, there’s nothing wrong with it, but they’ll go over it just the same, I may even get some new shiny stuff. I’m going to be back behind the wheel soon, this time for a trip to another coast, the Pacific this time, destination Los Angeles, look out for the next update and I’ll tell you all about it…..

I had planned to leave on Monday, but a social event the following weekend would mean I had to leave out on Sunday instead, this trip would take longer than my 70hr weekly duty time, so at some point I would need to park for 36hrs to reset my clock. My previous trip had left me with enough hours to get to Lethbridge on that duty cycle, so after an evening at the house I set off Sunday morning for the journey out west across The Prairies, to be honest, it’s not my favorite run, although I’m getting happier about it. This stems from my British roots, being a small island of 60million people, there’s always someone around, it’s a very busy place. I used to absolutely hate running west, there’s nothing to see, not a lot of places to stop and eat, nobody around, it’s all much the same, mile after mile after mile, but they are easy miles, the weather can make it hard work in winter time, but in early spring, it’s an easy way of racking up the miles. I’m also starting to appreciate the lack of people out there and given the choice between a run out West or a short haul south of the border, I’d take the west every time.

Day two of the trip was a day off, I had switched my loaded trailer at the customer for an empty and spent the day watching movies and generally doing nothing much. I speak to friends outside the trucking industry, they don’t understand this part of the job, they either think it’s a holiday or that it’s boring, but it’s part of what we do, sometimes I’m lucky enough to have a day off in a place where I can go out and play the tourist, other times I’m not.

Back to work today, I left Lethbridge and made my way to Medicine Hat to pick up my load for Texas, of course that involved stopping off for a Latte in Starbucks on the way. Loading didn’t take long and I was heading out twenty minutes after hitting the dock, I had to fax my paperwork off to the office so that they could organize my customs clearance to cross the border into the USA, so I made for the nearest truckstop and did just that, while the behind the scenes stuff was going on I made my way south to Coutts and the border. By the time I arrived I’d had a call from the office telling me everything was set up, so I was soon south of the border and heading down I-15 for Great Falls, Montana, where, after a fuel stop for both 361 and myself, I would cut across country to Billings. I have a lot of ground to cover in the next few days, so I maxed out my hours and stopped for the night in Big Horn, home of the legendary battle between General George Armstrong Custer, his 7th Cavalry and the combined forces of the Arapaho, Cheyenne and Sioux tribes, led by Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. The battle on the 25th and 26th of June 1876 may have been a loss for the paleface, but it was a turning point in the war, the American people were so outraged by the loss that the Government sent in thousands of troops who eventually overwhelmed the natives into submission. Thankfully this was way before my time, so I had a peaceful night’s sleep.

Day three started out perfectly, I did my pre-trip inspection basking in the sunshine, however the weather was about to take a turn for the worse, although that was not for a few hours, the short run down to the Wyoming state line was glorious, it stayed that way until Gillette, the self proclaimed ‘Energy Capital of the Nation’ Vast deposits of Coal, Oil and Coal Bed Methane Gas are found in the area and give credence to that claim. Usually I would’ve taken I-25 south, but the weather I mentioned earlier was responsible for the change of route. There were very strong winds from the west and the possibility of a Winter Storm around Cheyenne in the south of the state, this area is very exposed and frequently suffers from shutdowns of the interstate, I didn’t want to get caught up in any of that, so headed further east before turning south. It added a few miles to my trip, but saved me a lot of time, not to mention fuel, as I was heading east now, I had a nice strong west wind behind me.

I ran along I-90 to the South Dakota state line, passing through Sundance, Wyoming, home of The Sundance Kid, made famous in the movie ‘Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid’ he was formally known as Harry Longabaugh and originally hailed from Pennsylvania, he gained notoriety when he hooked up with ‘The Wild Bunch’ alongside Robert Leroy Parker, better known as Butch Cassidy, the ‘Kid’ got his name in prison, after being sentenced to 18months for stealing a horse, saddle and a gun from a ranch in Sundance. Again, this was years ago, so I had no problems with gun toting cowboys. I did get a hold up of sorts when I went into the Port of Entry and, after scaling, had to go inside the office and produce my truck papers to the DOT officers inside, all was well and I was soon heading east again. A couple of hours later I reached Murdo and made the turn south on US83. I followed this down through South Dakota into Nebraska and made it just over the state line into Kansas before the log book called a halt on the day’s driving.

Waking up in Oberlin, Kansas didn’t do my fancy coffee addiction any good, it was a bit of a one horse town and I had to wait three and a half hours before I came into a town big enough to have a McDonalds and top up on a Latte. This was in Dodge City, a first for me, I’ve never been through here before and was grateful for the bad weather that made my detour necessary. Although famous as a town for desperados, it was actually the railroad that put it on the map. The Texan Cattle Ranchers had long been driving their Longhorns north during the summer months for the lush pastures of Kansas. A quarantine line had been established in the eastern part of the state to combat a disease among the cattle; Dodge City was west of this line and soon overtook Wichita to become Queen of the Cow Towns. The Santa Fe railroad passed through Dodge City, so as well as an increase in cattle, there was also an increase in Cowboys and their notorious bad behavior. Today however its home to two huge Meat Packing plants and apart from the tourist trap saloons, it’s like any other sleepy Western Kansas community.

I also gave 361 a drink while I sipped on my Latte, it was time to take advantage of the cheap (er) fuel of Kansas, and so I topped off the tanks in the Flying J truckstop. Having woken up in the middle of nowhere, I had yet to shower, so got that out of the way too. From there I continued south on US283 all the way through Kansas, Oklahoma and into the Lone Star State where I got off the two lane roads and picked up four lane US287 at Vernon and headed towards Fort Worth. This was also an important part of Cowboy folklore, it was on the Chisholm Trail, which led to, among other towns, Dodge City, it was a serious rival for bad behavior from the Cowboys passing through, Fort worth with its huge stockyards was the last place a Cowboy could spend his hard earned cash before heading north to Dodge City and the appropriately named ‘Hell’s Half Acre’ was a section of the city best avoided if you wanted to see another day, it really was the Wild Wild West. Today it’s more famous for its airport, which if the sign outside is correct, covers an area larger than the city of Manhattan. I timed it right and went through in the evening so missed the huge back ups that occur during rush hours. A couple of hours later I was in Waco, a little known town until 1993 and the siege between the Feds and the Branch Davidians, it got worldwide publicity in the aftermath of that incident. More recently Waco was the home of the White House Press Center; President George W Bush has a house 20miles west of the city. Today though it was my home for the night as I parked at the Flying J truckstop in the town.

I had a lot to do today, so made an early start, after a shower and a coffee, I had to make my delivery at 1pm and I had a four hour run to get there, I got off I-35 at Temple and ran on US190 to Cameron where I picked up US77 which would take me almost all the way to my destination, I’ve run this road a few times now, we come down this way on a regular basis, as with a lot of this trip, it’s a two lane highway for the most part, but it’s free of traffic, so apart from slowing for the towns, it’s good running. I like running down roads like this, I think you see the real America this way. I made it my delivery with time to spare, it was to a huge Chemical Plant and before entering I had to watch a 15minute safety video to ensure I knew what to do in an emergency. Why I need to watch a 15minute video is beyond me, I already know what to do in an emergency at a Chemical Plant……RUN RUN RUN!

Fortunately, no need for any running today, I was in and out of the place in under an hour and heading north on US77 again to my reload in Schulenburg, this is a regular job and as usual I was pulling out of the gate with my load on soon after arriving. I retraced my steps north to Fort Worth where I continued on I-35 north, I was taking this load to the yard not Alberta. I filled my belly in a Subway and topped off the tanks in Fort Worth, in the Pilot truckstop there was a lot of Nascar merchandise on sale, a lot more than usual, not being a fan of the ‘left turn racers’ I was unaware that the Texas Motor Speedway was just emptying its parking lot of fans, at capacity it can hold over 190000 people. Judging by the traffic trying to leave, there couldn’t have been many empty seats that night. The local cops were doing a good job of keeping things moving, so I sailed through at the speed limit, another ten minutes in the truckstop and I would’ve been tangled up in it all, good luck on my part.

I parked for the night at Marietta, Oklahoma. I could’ve made it a little further, but in order to keep up my quota of Lattes I had stopped outside a McDonalds with truck parking. From there I carried on I-35 to Oklahoma City, this city was formed in what has become known as ‘The Land Run’ in 1889, this was where settlers could claim title to unassigned land in plots up to 160acres, by noon on the first day the empty land became a new city with a population of 10000, today it’s population has swelled to a over a hundred times that size, luckily for me, they were not on the road as I went through on my north. I soon put Oklahoma in my mirrors and entered Kansas again, this time on the Kansas Turnpike, at Wichita I came off the turnpike and took I-135 north, until the lure of a KFC buffet was too strong to resist and I went in for dinner. From there I continued north and I-135 became US81, it’s still a four lane and there are only a few towns that do not have a bypass, so it’s a good route. I followed it up through Kansas, into Nebraska and onto South Dakota. I took I-90 east at the intersection with US81 and parked in Sioux Falls for the night.

Today was going to be an easy run, I only had a short run up I-29 to the yard, so I made a leisurely start after the obligatory Latte, I left one Dakota behind and entered another, not much to see along here until I stopped in Fargo for fuel, a shower and lunch. I then set off for the run to the border; usually it takes a little over two hours, today it took over double that. The Red River had burst its banks and the flood water had reached the interstate. The Highway Patrol were allowing trucks through the 8-10 inches of floodwater, but it would overwhelm smaller vehicles, so they were being turned around and sent back to Fargo where they would have to head west of the city before turning north again, this caused a bit of a back up and slowed me down considerably. Then I reached the flooded section of the interstate, the DOT had placed cones at the edge of the road so that we could drive through the flooded area, but it was quite unnerving still, it looked as if I was driving over a lake, as far as I could see in any direction there was water, it was a very strange feeling to be driving a big truck through it.

I made it through without shipwrecking and arrived at the border much later than expected, I only lost a couple of hours altogether, but it’s frustrating when it’s that late in the journey, considering the distance I’d covered up to that point, I’d had no hold ups whatsoever, yet here I was, less than three hours from the yard and I hit my first delay! I made it though and after finishing off my paperwork and parking 361, I was in my car and heading home in time for supper with my family, another week down and in the books.

Now having said that, I always have a big smile on my face when I learn that my next trip is to California, so with a big beaming grin I head off to the yard on day one, as you’ve worked out from my previous entries, I’m not a fan of early morning starts, so I don’t arrive at the yard until early afternoon, but I’ve got plenty of time to get to my destination, Terra Bella, California. This is deep in the heart of California’s produce country. I’m delivering to a massive garden complex that grows indoor plants from seeds; this means that instead of concrete buildings, I get to look out over fields of colorful plants and flowers as I get unloaded. However, first I have a couple of thousand miles to put behind me. The first twenty five take me to the border with the United States at Pembina, North Dakota, after presenting my documents to the Customs Officer I’m soon heading south on I-29, this only lasts for a mile before my first stop, this is to scale my truck to ensure that I have my axle weight in the right place, I also make sure that I have enough leeway so I can move the trailer tandems forward when I get to California, they have different laws regarding the ‘Bridge Formula’ rather than risk attention from the DOT, I like to make sure I can get it right way before I reach the State Line.

Everything was to my satisfaction, next stop Fargo, I only made a quick pit stop for a bite to eat and a coffee, my late departure meant I had a long way to go and a short time to get there. I also made a change of direction at Fargo, I was now heading west on I-94, as it turns out I was heading straight for a snowstorm, but as the sun started to go down, the sky was clear, so I sat back and watched the miles roll by. Then came the snow, oh boy did it come, being a late winter storm the temperature was pretty mild, this made the snow wet and slippery, not a lot of fun in an 18 wheeler I have to say, but it’s all part of the job, we truckers may moan about it, but secretly we enjoy the challenge of keeping it all on the road and getting there on time no matter what hazards we face along the way. Kind of like modern day cowboys, although North Dakota has a law that makes it illegal to lie down and sleep with your boots on, so we can’t be proper cowboys!

The storm ended just before the State Line and by the time I entered Montana the road was once again black. After checking for sheep in my cab to avoid breaking a Montana law, I stopped for the night in Miles City having done enough to make the next couple of days reasonably easy. The following morning, after coffee, I filled the tanks as I did my pre trip inspection and hit the road again. It was a glorious day and I made good time to Billings where I-94 became I-90. I followed this to Bozeman where I headed south on US191 through the Yellowstone National Park, this route follows the Gallatin River and the sights are awesome, wild Bison roam along the side and sometimes the middle of the road. I want to take some pictures of this, but the road briefly crosses into Wyoming, they have a law that makes it illegal to take photographs of a Rabbit between January and April, so I keep my camera switched off to avoid unintentionally landing up in jail.

US191 soon joins US20, officially the longest road in the USA. I’m only on it for a couple of hours though, but the part I see has to be among the most picturesque along the whole route, it enters Idaho and runs through the Targhee National Forest, there are a lot of cabins just off the highway and during the winter month’s it is a very popular area for snowmobiling, as you can see from the pictures, they’re not exactly short on snow in this part of the world. It was still cold enough to ensure the lakes were frozen too, so I was in no danger of breaking the State Law that makes it illegal to fish from a camel!

I stopped off in Idaho Falls, home of the first Nuclear Reactor to produce electricity, it’s also the site of the one and only fatal nuclear explosion in the United States, hopefully the radiation is well contained as my stop was at Walmart so I could stock up on groceries. The shopping done it was time to head south again, this time on I-15 down through Pocatello, where I made sure I was smiling to avoid breaking yet another goofy law that makes it illegal to be seen in public without a smile on your face. From there I motored on south to the Utah State Line, not long to go now before I called it a day an hour or so inside Utah. Hopefully my groceries are nuclear free, it’s illegal to detonate a nuclear weapon in the State of Utah, it is also illegal to hunt Whales in the landlocked state. As that messed up my plans for the evening I decided to read my book before I went to bed in Ogden, home of the first Flying J truckstop.

A McDonalds is conveniently located next door the truckstop, I walked over for my breakfast Latte and sat in the springtime sunshine as I drank it, it was still morning rush hour so I let the wacky races finish before I set off south through Salt Lake City. I’ve done a lot of reading about this famous old city, it’s a very interesting place, I’ve put it on my list of places to visit and explore. After the urban sprawl of the big city which lives in the shadows of the Wasatch Mountains I’m soon out in open country again, the mountains are on my left until I get a couple of hundred miles south where they end and the Colorado Plateau begins, from snow capped peaks to arid dessert like sandstone in a few hours drive, it’s an amazing place.

After St George at the southern end of Utah, I cross into Arizona and pass through the Virgin River Gorge, this is another breathtakingly beautiful part of the world, it’s a mini Grand Canyon and has to be seen to be believed, hopefully the pictures I got will do it justice.

My time in Arizona was brief; I didn’t have enough time to go hunting Camels, which was lucky for me as this is illegal in the State. I-15 only cuts through a corner and soon enters Nevada, it’s been a while since I had a Latte, so a visit to McD’s was long overdue. I had some in cab cuisine at the same time, I had bought a couple of salads the day before, tonight’s culinary delight consisted of a Cobb Salad, very nice it was too. It was time to hit the road again, only a short leg this time, I needed to feed 361, so I was heading for the bright lights of Sin City, not to gamble and party unfortunately. My flying visit was over, my tanks were full and I headed out onto the Interstate once more, there was a distinct lack of Camels on the highway, I was expecting more as neighboring Arizona bans the hunting of them, but apparently it’s illegal to drive Camels down the highway in Nevada, you have to wonder what the Western States have against the poor Camel, ugly and smelly they may be, but they are a rather persecuted beast in these parts.

Sin City was a dot in my mirrors as I started the long climb just over the California State Line, here they’re a little kinder to the Camel, but unlike Utah, they will allow you to hunt a Whale, in fact it’s the only game you can shoot from a moving vehicle! Not many Whales around out in this part of the State, it’s the gateway to the Mojave Dessert, the first climb is a big one, but my big Peterbilt makes easy work of it and I’m soon descending the other side towards Baker, home of the World’s Largest Thermometer. From there I make good time at the Double Nickel speed limit to Barstow, where I’m calling it a day, I have plenty of time left, but I have a plan for the morning as you will see.

I am a bit of a chromaholic, I have a fetish for shiny things and if they also wear a Peterbilt badge then I’m in heaven, however, the winter has taken its toll on poor 361, today I’m going to put that right, first step was a good wash and towel dry, next on the agenda was a machine polish of all the chrome and aluminum parts, that all seems like a lot of hard work, but I must confess I was in the audience rather than on the stage for all the hard work. In my mind if you want a good job done, you call in the professionals, luckily the boss men agree, the finished job looked totally amazing and I took full advantage of the beautiful sunshine and took a bunch of photographs, there was a purpose behind this, but I’m keeping tight lipped about it, so watch this space, all will be revealed.

Time for some real work now, my destination Terra Bella was a three hour run across Highway 58, passing Edwards Air Force Base, almost every USAF plane since 1950 has been tested at this airbase, it was also a landing site for the Space Shuttle. I had to keep my eyes on the road though, the 55mph limit for trucks is strictly enforced and I didn’t want to meet up with Jon and Ponch. I arrived at my delivery at lunchtime, running on Pacific Time really suits me, I can get up at my usual 9-10am Central Time and still be early, of course it works the other way when I head east, but I’m not, so this week I’m on the early shift.

My trailer is now empty, I’m loading Dairy Products next, so priority number one is to get the trailer washed out, I do this at Wheeler Ridge, located on I-5 just north of the infamous Grapevine, it’s the road through the Tejon Mountain Pass. After washing out the trailer I decide to hang out in the area for a while, my collection in LA is not until the next day and rush hour is approaching, not a good time to be on the roads and I have a Chinese Meal while I wait for the madness to subside. After that I run down into LA and park for the evening in the shipper’s yard. I go for a stroll to work off the excesses of the afternoon in a Chinese Restaurant before having an early night.

I had an early appointment to load, but there was a stock issue, the stuff I wanted was on another truck and was not due to arrive until later on that day, so I made the most of my free time and went to Starbucks for, yes you’ve guessed, a Latte. I then did some more grocery shopping, but this time it was for fresh fruit and fresh it is, trust me, the Strawberries were awesome. I spent the rest of the day messing around on the internet and generally loafing around. My load eventually arrived and I backed up to the dock. Within an hour I was loaded and ready to roll, however it was getting late, even by my standards, so I decided to return as far as Barstow and call it a day, I had plenty of hours, but also had plenty of time to get to my destination, no point running through the night when I don’t need to.

Today started in typical Californian style, lots of sunshine, after getting the truck polished, it’s just what the Doctor ordered, so is the Latte that I had with good friend and fellow Paul Brandt driver, (Gorgeous) George, so named after a character in the movie, Snatch. We had an hour or so catching up, then he set off for Terra Bella, I headed north for Canada, retracing my steps on I-15 up through the last of California, into Nevada, through Vegas, where I again topped off the tanks and grabbed a coffee, then on through Arizona and into Utah as far as Ogden again, tonight I was not alone and the truckstops were all full, I did manage to park, but it was in a slot that everyone else had missed because it was so hard to get into, all those years of driving in little England had made me a bit more ambitious than most, so I managed to thread my Peterbilt through the eye of the needle and into the hole.

McD’s again for coffee, Flying J for the shower, a good start to any day as far as I’m concerned, the sun was still shining too and 361 looked resplendent against the snowcapped mountain backdrop. I had a big day in front of me today, I wanted to cross the border and get as close to my destination as possible before I ran out of log book. I made good time up through the remainder of Utah and was soon back in Idaho Falls for a visit to Starbucks. That taken care of I was soon back in Montana. This part of the journey can be very difficult in the winter, they get a lot of snow and the roads are, shall we say, difficult. Today however all was good; there was some snow melt which made the roads wet, but 361 stayed nice and shiny nonetheless. I made the border with time to spare, I only set foot in Montana once, long enough to fill the tanks and have my remaining Walmart Salad, this time a Chicken Caesar, again it was very nice, well as nice as a bowl of green stuff can be!

Back on my adopted home soil again, I called time at Vulcan, home of Doctor Spock, he must’ve been away fighting the Klingons tonight as there was no sign of him. I paid homage to the Starship Enterprise and was asleep at Warp Factor 9 within minutes of setting the brakes.

No fancy coffee on offer at Vulcan, so I had to wait until Airdrie, there’s a few places around Calgary, but I bypass this to avoid the traffic and the terrible condition of the road surface, running through here will loosen your fillings. I had a little fun when I did stop for coffee, the girls in Starbucks saw the Paul Brandt truck outside and assumed it was the singer, I told them that I was a specialist in Rock Star transportation and that Paul had headhunted me from my previous job with the Rolling Stones, but I couldn’t keep a straight face so I came clean and told them the truth, they weren’t so excited to see me then, but still made me a very good Latte and some Lemon Pound Cake that should be available on prescription, it’s that good. Fed and watered I run the next couple of hours to my destination in Edmonton with a smile on my face, even though it isn’t law in Alberta.

My time in Edmonton was a brief one; I dropped my loaded trailer and hooked onto another loaded one, destination Winnipeg, heading for home at last, just the small matter of getting there. It’s a long run, but an easy one, The Prairies are pretty empty, at times it’s hard to tell where you are, it could be Alberta, Saskatchewan or Manitoba, but although it’s not much fun, the miles that go under the bumper are the easiest of the whole trip. I make it as far as Regina, formerly known as Pile of Bones. I prefer the old name to be honest, but whatever it’s called it is only a five hour run from there to Winnipeg and best of all, it has a Starbucks to keep me in Lattes.

Arriving in Winnipeg I again drop my loaded trailer, hook onto an empty, grab a Starbucks and make my way back to Morris, another trip done, I have a long break in front of me too, I am going back to England for a couple of weeks, that’s about the same distance as I’ve covered on this trip, it’s a lot quicker by plane, although it’s nowhere near as much fun.

The main page will give you all the information you need on Paul Brandt Trucking, from its humble beginnings, through to its present state, but our aim is to give you an insight into what we do and how we do it. You’ll be following me, Mark Lee, as I drive truck 361 all over Canada and the USA, for those of you directly involved in the trucking industry, hopefully it’ll be entertaining, for those of you who are not we hope to, not only entertain you, but also show you just what goes into moving freight from A to B.

I’ve been at Paul Brandt Trucking for a little over two years now, I joined the company shortly after my arrival in Canada from England, where I was also a long haul truck driver, both as a company driver and a small fleet operator, I’ve driven throughout Europe and Scandinavia with a couple of trips into Asia and North Africa. I also spent a ‘gap year’ as a trucking journalist and a road tester, I still have a column in Truck & Driver magazine and in that I also write about my exploits as a driver on this side of the Atlantic in Truck West.

So now to business, my first blog is a trip from our yard in Morris MB to Houston, Texas, after unloading there I went over to Baton Rouge, Louisiana to load for Calgary, Alberta, all in all a busy, but normal week in my life at Paul Brandt Trucking. That’s just the way that I like it too, for me, the longer the trip, the better. Our location in Manitoba allows me to get to some of the furthest corners in North America and back within my weekly driving hours, so I can do the big jobs and still get home to spend time with my family and friends, that’s as good as it gets in my book, it doesn’t always work out that way, but that’s ok too.

This trip followed some vacation time for me, we’ve just moved into a new house and the past few weeks had been manic, I was glad to get back behind the wheel and have a rest! I set off in a mini convoy with one of our owner operators who was running down to Arizona, we would run together for the first day and part of the second day. We started out from the yard in Morris after doing our pre-trip inspections and taking on some fuel, it’s a short 20minute run down to the border where we crossed into the USA, we then stopped to scale our trucks to make sure we had no problems with the DOT, we then ran down through North Dakota on I-29. At Fargo it was time for a quick break, there was a winter storm expected along the I-80 corridor so we wanted to get down there before it started to have an impact on the highways, as it turned out we made a good call, the run through North and South Dakota was trouble free, we never saw any snow until we crossed the Nebraska State Line, unfortunately we would see far too much of it before we stopped for the night at York. The last 100miles were quite difficult, but the late hour meant that traffic was light and we never lost any time. We stopped for the night just before the clock struck midnight.

I started the next day with a shower in the truckstop and a fancy coffee from Starbucks; I do my best not to conform to any of the trucker stereotypes, so a regular cup of Joe is not an option! After that it’s time to earn my keep and I point the big Pete towards Kansas, after a couple of hours Mike, the owner operator and I part company, he starts heading west and I continue southbound, today was another uneventful day, the weather was a complete contrast to the night before, it was cold, but bright and sunny, hopefully a taste of things to come. Nebraska turned into Kansas and a few hours later Kansas turned into Oklahoma. It was time for some driver fuel, so I stopped at a Subway and grabbed a sandwich and found myself a quiet spot to take a break, I went online and caught up with some emails while eating my sandwich. An hour later it was time to take on some truck fuel & hit the road again, I still had a long way to go today. Oklahoma was soon in my mirrors and as I passed truck heaven, or Denton, the home of Peterbilt trucks, my easy ride was temporarily over, the Big D was approaching and around here you have to have your wits about you to emerge unscathed. The Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex is consistently ranked in the top 5 worst cities to drive in, trust me, it’s reputation is not undeserved!

I stopped for some supper just south of Dallas on I-45, I had a craving for a burger and my good friend Ronnie McD helped me satisfy my needs. I motored on into the evening and stopped for the night in a rest area a couple of hours north of Houston.

My delivery appointment was for midday, so no need for an early start, which is a good thing as far as I’m concerned, I don’t even start to dream about my Rice Krispies until most people have started their day! I also miss the morning rush hour, so I can justify it too; no sense in adding to already congested highways unless it’s necessary. My delivery was on the south side of Houston and to get there I had to pass the NASA headquarters, even though I’ve been past many times, I still feel like I’m a tourist when I see the signs and see the buildings where the spacemen and rocket scientists play. My unloading was a bit less space age and involved a fork lift truck; the driver did his best to convince me otherwise and managed to get my load off as if the fork lift was rocket propelled! In this instance I was in no rush, I had called into dispatch on the way down and my reload was not until the following morning, I had a ways to go to get there, but had plenty of time to do it.

My next port of call was Baton Rouge, Louisiana; I had a nice slow ride over there in the rain. Cajun food is one of my favorites, so I was looking forward to supper, to get myself in the mood I parked up and went online to watch fellow countryman Gordon Ramsey throw things around someone’s kitchen in his pursuit of culinary excellence. It was an Italian restaurant under his scrutiny this time, so as entertaining as it was it didn’t help my choice that night. In the end I opted for Jambalaya, very rustic and very tasty, after that I spent the rest of the evening reading a book before a shower and an early night.

I had to get up at 6am to make my loading appointment of 7am, I can do it when I need to, but my Rice Krispies don’t taste the same before 10am. I made my way from the truckstop to the loading point and after checking in I’m soon backing into the dock and getting loaded for Calgary, Alberta some 2500miles away. Depending on any number of factors I could be taking this load back to the yard, where it will be relayed to Alberta by another driver, or I could run it out west myself, in this instance it was the latter, as I’ve said, I like the big runs, so I was more than happy with the outcome. After scaling to make sure my weights are legal I pointed 361 towards the North West and after some lunch I started the long run to Calgary. Louisiana finished at Shreveport and I entered Texas again, the Big D had to be tackled once more, but it was a trouble free run through and I left the interstate and made my way towards Amarillo. Texas being as huge as it is meant that I never made it that far, but I did enough to make sure I would have a reasonably unhurried run to my delivery a few days later.

No Starbucks in this part of the world, so I had to make do with one of my good friend Ronald’s coffee’s this morning, it hit the target and I once again headed north west, I passed through Amarillo and resisted the temptation to stop for a 72oz steak, which is free if you can eat it in under an hour, there must be some big appetites in Texas. A little further north and I once again entered Oklahoma, it was to be a short visit though, Colorado was only a few miles away. My fuel tanks were getting low so at Limon I stopped to top them off, have a bite to eat and grab a shower. Today was going to be a full day and I wanted to make it into Wyoming, which being as sparse as it is doesn’t offer many places to stop, the more time I had left, the more options I would have.

Running into the evening meant that the Mile High city of Denver was also traffic free; I put the remaining part of Colorado under my bumper and rolled on until my hours were up. I parked for the night near Douglas, Wyoming and watched a DVD before bed.

Only the rest of Wyoming, Montana, the border with Canada and part of Alberta to get done today, I really enjoy running up here, the scenery is spectacular; it’s real cowboy country although the 21^st century cowboys use ATVs instead of the more traditional horse. Being cowboy country they have some awesome steak on the menu, it cannot rival the offering from Amarillo in size, but in taste it has few competitors, with this in mind it would be rude not to sample some so I have a late lunch/early supper soon after crossing the Montana State Line at Billings, from here I leave the interstate behind once again and head across country to Great Falls where I would pick up the Interstate again for the run to the border. I had already faxed off my customs documentation to the broker, so the crossing back into Canada was a formality, next stop on my return was an obligatory visit to Timmies for coffee and, of course, donuts. I was approaching the limits of my driving hours for the seven day period as I arrived at Vulcan, the home of Doctor Spock, so after filling up the tanks I parked for the night at a fuel stop there.

As today was day eight of my trip my driving hours from my first day stopped counting towards my total, so I was able to get to my delivery in Calgary, not without the help of Ben, my dispatcher, the delivery point was on a new industrial area and was not in any map or on GPS, a quick phone call later and I was soon heading in the right direction. As a result of my finely tuned skills, or sheer good luck as it’s more commonly referred to, I was not far away and I made my appointment with time to spare, it had taken almost four days to get there and to arrive on schedule may seem hard to do, but it’s what we do day in and day out, the guys back at base know what we’re capable of and although we work quite hard at times, we’re never pushed. I still had plenty of time left on the day’s log book and used up a little more making my way to Medicine Hat and the location of my pick up the next morning. I was feeling very British today, so went into Joeys and had proper Fish, Chips and Mushy Peas before once again watching Mr. Ramsey trying to outdo himself on how many bleeps he can get in one sentence!

Starbucks once again provide my morning refreshment and I made my way to pick up my load, this one was going back to yard for someone else to run to it’s destination on the East Coast, I was due a couple of days home time to do some relaxing, I just had to run the Trans Canada Highway for the rest of the day before that could happen. The weather had been good all trip, save for the snow on day one, that was set to continue, it was cold all the way, even on the Gulf Coast it had barely gotten above freezing, but back home in the Prairies, cold has a different meaning. The final miles went under the bumper and I arrived back in Morris, parked the truck, did my paperwork and loaded my belongings into my car for journey back to the house. Another week’s work done.