Talking of Long Distance Diaries. One single incident, for me, justified all the hard work I had done to submit those LDDs to TRUCK magazine. It was about 2001/2 time and I had boarded one of the ferries from Ancona in Italy to Patras in Greece. A gathering of KFOR lorries had also boarded. KFOR drivers were bound for Kosovo with supplies for the British army and like all those low-key civilian operations, the drivers were always ex-servicemen. I got chatting to the drivers on board and we shared a bottle of retsina or six. I got lost coming out of the gents and I told them, ‘If I can’t find my way out of the gents on a ferry, how the f**ck am I going to find my way to Doha?’ Much mirth ensued. Then one of their drivers came up with a tale and recounted a similar tale involving my rescuing a driver in Romania. ‘You just got that from a magazine article, you’re just bull-sh*tting!’ he exclaimed angrily. I quietly informed him that I had written the original article. ‘So you must be Robert Hackford!’ he said. I answered in the affirmative. ‘You are the reason I am here,’ this fierce young and adventurous driver declared. ‘I was inspired to do long-haul work by your Long Distance Diaries! And I love this work’. Ladies and gentlemen, I rest my case: I am no longer guilty of leading the young astray - and what a perfect endorsement of my LDDs. Sigh! Sometimes the world can be alright. Robert