Brilliant quality pics, great memo’s - keep 'em coming
Excellent pictures Uncle Bob, nice to see this thread bounce back up again. Don’t those Greek hill roads look slippy??!!! 
bullitt:
Excellent pictures Uncle Bob, nice to see this thread bounce back up again. Don’t those Greek hill roads look slippy??!!!
Oh lordy yes, ya Bullitt! Here’s a pic taken on the same trip of one that didn’t quite make it . The composite marble and asphalt road surfaces in Greece made for tricky traction even in the rain, let alone snow!
And for younger readers, here’s a pic of the lorry Dave Poulten drove for Astran in the '70s 
Hello David. How nice to see you here. Welcome
David Miller,(Ellingham, Oryx, Grangewood)
Hi David - Nice to hear from you matey - hope you are keeping well and out of trouble 
Hello Freddie.
Nice to hear from you too. I’m not doing too well but still breathing fairly regularly
David
David Miller:
Hello Freddie.
Nice to hear from you too. I’m not doing too well but still breathing fairly regularlyDavid
I sure miss such dry humour. I live in Germany. They can be humourous, honestly, but you guys are in a different league.
Johnny
Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk
Fair comment - The Germans are not noted for their sense of humour, but I have great memories of their country - fantastic scenery, good grub.
Hello Robert,
good to hear from you. Nice pics. That old 143 was a beautiful motor. Ive got a lot of good memories about the middle east but I wouldnt want to go back to it now. altogether I suppose I must have done about 170 trips. I did quite a few for Trevor Marks and Barry Barnes as well as Astran. I retired 4 weeks ago today. Everyone said I’d miss it all,but not a bit. Lots to do here. Renewing all the facia and barge boards. Enough to keep me going for a few months. All the best
dave
tracker:
Renewing all the facia and barge boards. Enough to keep me going for a few months
Could be a long job. Is that on the house or the wife?
tracker:
Hello Robert,
good to hear from you. Nice pics. That old 143 was a beautiful motor. Ive got a lot of good memories about the middle east but I wouldnt want to go back to it now. altogether I suppose I must have done about 170 trips. I did quite a few for Trevor Marks and Barry Barnes as well as Astran. I retired 4 weeks ago today. Everyone said I’d miss it all,but not a bit. Lots to do here. Renewing all the facia and barge boards. Enough to keep me going for a few months. All the best
dave
I’m with you there, Dave; I’m happily retired and have no desire to go back down the road either - well, not as a career driver! The last time I saw Trevor Marks was at Londra Camp Istanbul in '02. We got Ali the taxi man to take us to a restaurant. The last time I saw Barry Barnes was at Haditha during the Hajj later that year. At least we still have the memories! Take care and good luck with that cladding! Robert
tracker:
Hello Robert,
good to hear from you. Nice pics. That old 143 was a beautiful motor. Ive got a lot of good memories about the middle east but I wouldnt want to go back to it now. altogether I suppose I must have done about 170 trips. I did quite a few for Trevor Marks and Barry Barnes as well as Astran. I retired 4 weeks ago today. Everyone said I’d miss it all,but not a bit. Lots to do here. Renewing all the facia and barge boards. Enough to keep me going for a few months. All the best
dave
Hi Dave, Its John Holland ex Asian Transport now living in Australia if you can send me an Email- johnholland042@gmail.com it would be nice to get in contact again. Regs John
JOHN HOLLAND:
tracker:
Hello Robert,
good to hear from you. Nice pics. That old 143 was a beautiful motor. Ive got a lot of good memories about the middle east but I wouldnt want to go back to it now. altogether I suppose I must have done about 170 trips. I did quite a few for Trevor Marks and Barry Barnes as well as Astran. I retired 4 weeks ago today. Everyone said I’d miss it all,but not a bit. Lots to do here. Renewing all the facia and barge boards. Enough to keep me going for a few months. All the best
daveHi Dave, Its John Holland ex Asian Transport now living in Australia if you can send me an Email- johnholland042@gmail.com it would be nice to get in contact again. Regs John
That Scania looks like it wold be about 55 / 57 ton empty… The longest I managed to get was 2 B doubles north out of Charter Towers up to Blenners…Saturday night favour…
Good to see you’re about Dave… I saw you down the Tap line a couple of times and I think it was you going over the Bospherous bridge as well in your red Trailways Volvo, I was in an Italian globetrotter and Cardi Fridge at the time…early to mid 90’s…
I asked Snake about retiring a few months back and he said we could come to a compromise… He wouldn’t send me out for any more than a fortnight at a time… May be 16 days or so, and nothing bigger than a B double… 2 trailers at the most…may be a B A B… and I could keep my Interstater for local work on my week off…
Here’s a thing I did a while back, when I was doing a couple of local collections…I don’t know if the link will work…
youtube.com/watch?v=1JLKegaM_IU&t=628s
Jeff…
Found another picture online of that French reproduction of an Astran wagon in the cream/ochre livery of the late '70s and it’s quite a creditable effort!
And here’s another piece of Astran fantasy of a quite different kind I photographed at Gaydon during the weekend. I have to say it is beautifully turned out and the chap who owns it had it done in memory of his late Middle-Easter dad.
Robert
what a beautifule scania his dad would be proud
Terrific pic - lovely piece of equipment
Pinched this from mahmut sonmezgul on FB. Will delete if the copyright owner objects. OK, Robert, can you make sense of the Arabic? The Word on the left may be Pakistan?
John.
John West:
Pinched this from mahmut sonmezgul on FB. Will delete if the copyright owner objects. OK, Robert, can you make sense of the Arabic? The Word on the left may be Pakistan?John.
0
It appears to say aseed lassit Pakistan. It may be the name of a place. The thing is that Arabic script is also used for Farsi and Urdu so the message is probably written in Urdu, the language of Pakistan. Sorry I can’t be of more help! Robert
Excellent work robert!
I do think the red and yellow livery suited the 141s rather well, much better than the later models.
The picture on the back of the 4 series cab posted earlier is the Bob Paul and Gordon Pearce truck isn’t it? Setting out for the Middle East from London way back when, it was in Ashley’s Marvellous book.
Looks like I missed seeing Neil jarmans stunning 141 recently at heaton park, rats!
Does anyone know if he is attending truckfest northwest this weekend with his 141 at all? I do hope so.
Many thanks