Dirty Dan:
Here are a couple ive taken. The two Dafs were in Nantali in Finland. They stod there when i returned from Tempere were i had loaded a stonecruser back home. I was there 1400 and the ferry deparded ca2200. The curtins were drawn al day and when the ferry left they were still drawn…
The Scania was taken in Arboga in nowember in 2016.
Danne
Yes a couple of very interesting photo’s Dan. I used Turku a few times myself. Sometimes to swap trailers and return to Moscow and other times to use the boat to England. I remember in 1994 the first Russian truck to use the Garden to get to England. The driver only came out of his cabin for meals.
I found editing very hard… I would let the story stand for a month or two then get back into it… but usually I though I hadn’t explained something well enough so I added another couple of hundred words here and there… Or I’d see something that would spark another memory… and that would be another 8000 word chapter… but that would alter something later on in another book so that would have to get another couple of hundred words to bring that up to speed as well…
I must have gone through mine 30 to 40 times… and that’s just writing… not mulling it over in my head before I wrote anything down… I spent loads of time trying to figure out what to put in and what to leave out… and there’s a lot that was left out…
I can’t imagine doing any of it now… I’d have to spend weeks when I got back just fill out OH&S reports… then there would be risk assessments… HR would have to be there wearing new hi viz vests, and clip boards, standing in the middle of a field, with hard hats…measuring things while they touch base with each other…
When I got back to the yard after being Hi jacked in southern Libya the boss gave me a handful of 100,000 lire notes to cover costs, and asked if I thought I’d be able to get to the China Border Thursday week…
Jelliot:
I found editing very hard… I would let the story stand for a month or two then get back into it… but usually I though I hadn’t explained something well enough so I added another couple of hundred words here and there… Or I’d see something that would spark another memory… and that would be another 8000 word chapter… but that would alter something later on in another book so that would have to get another couple of hundred words to bring that up to speed as well…
I must have gone through mine 30 to 40 times… and that’s just writing… not mulling it over in my head before I wrote anything down… I spent loads of time trying to figure out what to put in and what to leave out… and there’s a lot that was left out…
I can’t imagine doing any of it now… I’d have to spend weeks when I got back just fill out OH&S reports… then there would be risk assessments… HR would have to be there wearing new hi viz vests, and clip boards, standing in the middle of a field, with hard hats…measuring things while they touch base with each other…
When I got back to the yard after being Hi jacked in southern Libya the boss gave me a handful of 100,000 lire notes to cover costs, and asked if I thought I’d be able to get to the China Border Thursday week…
Jeff…
Yeah. Mine was written over the course of a number of years. Because I had other stuff to do.
H.R. and Bosses eh ? That was some fair old running around that you did Jeff. Southern Libya and then China, like that.
But you must have enjoyed it.
Really interesting Eric. Their workshops were very good. When I needed to use them they did a good job on my truck.
I remember the Sovtrans drivers dropping their trailers in Zeebrugge and waiting for the next one to ship back from Dover.
I think that it was Brain Haulage from London who used to run them about in the U.K.
I don’t know why they did not come over to England then. Whether they did not want to drive on the left, or were not allowed to.
Keep posting on here Eric, because you are putting some fascinating pictures on.
Really interesting Eric. Their workshops were very good. When I needed to use them they did a good job on my truck.
I remember the Sovtrans drivers dropping their trailers in Zeebrugge and waiting for the next one to ship back from Dover.
I think that it was Brain Haulage from London who used to run them about in the U.K.
I don’t know why they did not come over to England then. Whether they did not want to drive on the left, or were not allowed to.
Keep posting on here Eric, because you are putting some fascinating pictures on.
Mick
hey Mike, The workshop at Zeebruges behind the Total fuelstation on the right hand side ■■?
Think that they had to drop trailers because of a lack of permits ■■
Which did some Iranians too, even the Hungarocamions did it arround 1970.
Or didn’t they need a permit for England ■■?, we Belgians didn’t need one, but for Ireland a must.
Hey, Yes Mike those big campanies had most good workshops and high trainings for their drivers too.
Was sometimes at Hungarocamion, and think they had spareparts for whole Europ of Volvo and MB.
Pitty they don’t exists as before, but with a bit more “perestrojka en glasnost”, which would be better for transporting
abroad for we as them.
Hi Mike
Great to see you have a book out and will wait till my holiday in May to read it and so look forward to it. Was a weird and wonderful place to drive to but as you no seriously scary in the winter and even some of the roads in the rain were terrifying!! Good to see the Russian and middle east topics still going as well
Dirty Dan:
Hi Colin! Great to see you posting again
Danne
Hi Dan
Hope all good and not been here in ages due to circumstances but glad to see there is still interest[/
Hi Colin! Yes al good here,still doing my heavy stuff dont get to see mutch now days we most keep around Stockholm. But then ill be home in my own bed almost every night… And the family seems to like me home aswell so thats always somthing
What are you up to now then?
Vodka Cola Cowboy:
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My truck in the queue at the Belarus/Polish border coming back out of Russia.
Having been heavily involved with haulage to and within the ex-Soviet Union, I felt that now was the time to open a thread dedicated to those operations. Having had my book, “Vodka Cola Cowboy” published, which charts my time living in and operating my own truck from Moscow, between 1990 and 1995, I have received numerous comments from readers who are fascinated by those times.
Many of those readers are truck drivers, who either drove to Russia or are interested in the operations.
I drove to destinations such as Odessa, Yalta, Krasnodar, Volgograd, Leningrad and up to Turku in Finland. There will be other truckers who drove to destinations further East, such as Uzbeckistan and Kazakhstan. It would be interesting to read about their adventures.
So, come on and add to the thread.
Micky T.
Didn’t Ralph Davies do Chinese Border? I seem to remember reading Trucking International as a kid? Maybe mistaken.
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
Hi Jeff. If you read through the earlier posts there are a number about Ralph Davies and Peter Gilder going to Kazak. Also Jeff Elliot, who drove for an Italian company. He used to tip on the Chinese border. You might find them interesting because I know that I did.
Thanks very much mate I will do just that.
Funny enough it was one of Peter Gilders lads that saved my arse in Dunkerque I had an old S reg Eurostar heading for Luxembourg on my first ever trip as an owner driver and ran out of diesel when I got off the boat.
Stuck where the road splits to in and out for 3 days! Skint no phone no night heater no nothing, anyway long story short one of Gilders lads stopped to ask if I was ok and ended up pulling me out of the crap, never did get that kids name but I did raise a glass to him when I finally got home because it got worse after that! A lot worse. I didn’t last long as an owner driver because the second trip was worse than the first, 3 days stuck on Antwerp docks with a dead Iveco.
Thanks again. [emoji1303]
Just a reminder of some of the wonderful road surfaces that we encountered in Russia. It was always a pleasure to drive over these.
I remember the road gangs, who used to re-tarmac the surfaces in the summer. A bloke with a tipper. Another man with a JCB. And a gang of women who used to spread the tarmac. I used to watch them and think “What a waste of time”. Because as soon as winter came and the temperatures dropped the surface would split and break up again.
Not much different to how they do things in Canada. Once you venture off the main drags, gravel roads are the norm and up north even the main drags are gravel, some of them are in better shape than the ‘proper’ roads.
I’m convinced the minister of highways has a company selling shock absorbers and suspension parts!
newmercman:
Not much different to how they do things in Canada. Once you venture off the main drags, gravel roads are the norm and up north even the main drags are gravel, some of them are in better shape than the ‘proper’ roads.
I’m convinced the minister of highways has a company selling shock absorbers and suspension parts!
Hi Newmercman. Yes, Russia has its share of gravel drags as well. It makes more sense, I suppose, because the top surfaces of tarmac drags split, because of the wide variation in temperatures. I mean in Moscow it can easily be +40C, in the summer and -35C in the winter. East of Moscow it can go down much lower than that.
