Astran / Middle East Drivers

Alison

Jeff Wood sends his love

Rita

mushroomman:
or JJ72 still sees Dave

see him? I can’t get bloody rid of him :wink: will ask him tomorrow - I remember sending a lad to load melons straight out of the field in Greece in August and them being so hot, the fridge had still barely pulled the temp down after about 12 hours :laughing:

I loaded Melons a few times & tipped them on the Holloway or Hornsey Road, it was the same thing, the buyer used to do his best Del Boy impersonation on the back of the trailer, 5 or 6 hrs later the trailer was empty & they’d give you a decent drink for your trouble. Loading them straight from the field in summer made the fridge work it’s nuts off too, I’ve been well into France before I got them down to temperature & that was after the 36hr boat to Bari or Brindisi.

If you want to have fun with a melon, put one on a BBQ & stand well back :open_mouth:

We always carried them in tilts when I worked for Anglo Greek. We used to take them to Andreas Demos, Palmers Green. N 13.

Hi I’ve been trying to remember who I used to load melons for, I think the Colonel has just jogged my memory, did he have a V shaped shop on a corner? When you arrived he would block off the pavement and stack the melons there, he had an old Citroen Safari estate and a son he used to bully terribly. If that is the same bloke I used to load for him from all over Greece,always paid on the dot on return.
When loading a tilt (after the first time :blush: ) I would take out the top board and thread it vertically through the others and inside the sideboard then ratchet-strap across the sideboards and also the first tilt board otherwise the trailer would look like a balloon on arriving in the UK(and hope you didn’t get a turnout in Dover!)
Happy day’s. Gavin

Hi Gavin. Demos had two shops, side by side and the one on the left was empty and was where the melons were unloaded into, although you will probably confirm that small vans were arriving all the time to take melons away to their individual shops. The truck and trailer we used to park in the immediate side road and he used supermarket trollies to take the melons into the shop.

The trailer that I had when working for Anglo Greek on the melons I had an extra set of board slots between the sideboards and the first board. I then used to drop the top board into this slot and with the webbing strap across all five of my sidegates this prevented the inevitable problems of a pregnant trailer.

If you remember, it was the Greeks that decided, in their wisdom, to load all fruit in fridges as the Greek truckers were looking to do their own work, after all, we used to load oranges in tilts from Corinth and in my opinion, the best way to carry them, as they arrived at destination in excellent condition for eating.

Fridges have spoilt the quality of fruit coming into this country now as they run at too low a temperature and are rock hard when they go on the shelf.

Once all the backloads were in the hand of the Greeks we started to backload from Italy.


my latest project , an FB89 in the astran colours

sinbin31:
Alison

Jeff Wood sends his love

Rita

And you can send it back! Seriously… thanks for the message Roger - hope Jeff’s well and content!

Alison

Hi Alison.

Where did the Sheeplady come from are you a Shepardess now ,roaming the country side with your crook and seductive smile,and Jeff is a grumpy old man now. Still looking for a date on the Internet ,bless him.

Roger

newmercman:
If you want to have fun with a melon, put one on a BBQ & stand well back :open_mouth:

is any particular variety best - i fancy a go at that :laughing: by the way steve, dave doesn’t particularly remember that so it might have been mr magoo - he does remember doing about 8 drops around fruit and veg shops in the midlands with a load of greek melons though

surprised nobody has mentioned that lots of times the bubbles would pay the driver in cash for the load, i think it was dave fuller from oxford who thought he’s mislaid the Ā£ 2500 one day when he returned to the yard - both our bums were a bit squeaky until he found it :unamused:

jj72:

newmercman:
If you want to have fun with a melon, put one on a BBQ & stand well back :open_mouth:

is any particular variety best - i fancy a go at that :laughing: by the way steve, dave doesn’t particularly remember that so it might have been mr magoo - he does remember doing about 8 drops around fruit and veg shops in the midlands with a load of greek melons though

surprised nobody has mentioned that lots of times the bubbles would pay the driver in cash for the load, i think it was dave fuller from oxford who thought he’s mislaid the Ā£ 2500 one day when he returned to the yard - both our bums were a bit squeaky until he found it :unamused:

Heres my old Transcon loading melons for Demos around 1990 I reckon, good money & breakfast plus a 7 day a week tip!

Colonel:
Hi Gavin. Demos had two shops, side by side and the one on the left was empty and was where the melons were unloaded into, although you will probably confirm that small vans were arriving all the time to take melons away to their individual shops. The truck and trailer we used to park in the immediate side road and he used supermarket trollies to take the melons into the shop.

The trailer that I had when working for Anglo Greek on the melons I had an extra set of board slots between the sideboards and the first board. I then used to drop the top board into this slot and with the webbing strap across all five of my sidegates this prevented the inevitable problems of a pregnant trailer.

If you remember, it was the Greeks that decided, in their wisdom, to load all fruit in fridges as the Greek truckers were looking to do their own work, after all, we used to load oranges in tilts from Corinth and in my opinion, the best way to carry them, as they arrived at destination in excellent condition for eating.

Fridges have spoilt the quality of fruit coming into this country now as they run at too low a temperature and are rock hard when they go on the shelf.

Once all the backloads were in the hand of the Greeks we started to backload from Italy.

This was the best way to load kapuzi Colonel on a 40’ not 1 smashed melon this load was for Chris up by the prison.

Lovely photo, Flysheet, but they are obviously in hoppers. Proof of course that they do not need to go in a fridge.

So this load you did for Chris Charalambidis?

Colonel:
Lovely photo, Flysheet, but they are obviously in hoppers. Proof of course that they do not need to go in a fridge.

So this load you did for Chris Charalambidis?

Yes Colonel it was for Charalambidis but he was struggling to sell them & diverted me to Mondials new yard near Enfield, Mr Etipa had a large fit as he had a yard full of trailers loaded with them onboard but when Chris came over he wanted the sheets off as he was convinced they’d be pulped, I unsheeted them & the pair of them where gobsmacked not 1 broken melon, I was payed in full & off I trotted with my wad!

As you say The Bubbles ruined the fruit in tilts thing with there fridge nonsence, lovely loads melons in the summer & oranges in the winter months, I seem to recall the oranges paid a tad less than the melons but tipping at night in Covent Garden kept the job quick.

Regards

Fly sheet

Yes, flysheet, those were indeed great days to do Greece. Triple parked on St. Nicholas sq. The harbour inn and Paniniottis to have a beer and talk the usual bulls**t.

I loved loading in Greece as Apostolis had some great workj back to the UK, Tinned fruit from Veria, Wine from Naoussa, the cotton yarn from Levadia and Preveza, the copper cable from Stylis and Corinth, Melons starting in Katerini and ending up on the peleponese, Peppers from Gastouni, drilling equipment from Alexandropolous and not forgetting the lovely job with British aerospace with the wings back to Middleton. Plenty I must have missed and you will no doubt point out to me.

Greece, like the Middle East was a one off experience which lasted for some time but then circumstances changed the way we did transport and now we have to suffer for it with all the foreign trucks now doing the work we should be doing.

greedygob:
hello chaps i never did me but plenty european work 1st run antwerp with john dee transport ferryhill. i no loads of lads who did me job my dads neighbour for 1 frank roach ect ect . my question is can any one remember syd crowther transport ferryhill on the middle east job one of the drivers was called skippy? i have some good photos all black n white i got of frank roach when he worked for taffy davies thanks anyway mel mitchell. :slight_smile:

agh another ex john dee pilot, i was based in antwerp/brussels and kortrijk for deeline

Hi All I’ve been a bit busy lately and missed quite a few replies so I’'ll see if I can remember some now.
Mushroomman i didn’t get any e-mail I’ve searched spam and to see if I accidentally binned it. Re your pic of Trans Arabian Freight (TAF) Trans Arabian had an office in Jeddah in 1976 (I don’t know if they had a yard) it was run by a young chap (we all were then :unamused: ) driving round in a Trans Am. I did not realise that they became TAF I never thought about it. I often asked people who had been there then what became of them , some claimed they became the ā€˜Arabian’ in Law-Arabian which I never believed.Somewhere else on here I read that they became part of Knights of Old which makes more sense-look at the address on your pic.Knights also had a big yard in Jeddah at that time.
Bestbooties, I cant remember much about the new road by-passing the desert I couldn’t remember using the old Turaif but I can remember the new Jordainian customs there, I also can’t remember where the road went except for the first time I used it trying to find the start of it near Ammam. :blush: I remember once getting to the Jordainian passport office to find it was full of locals and Turks all forming a scrum along the counter. I just managed to get in the door and stood there holding my passport up near my face so it couldn’t be knocked out of my hand and wondering how the hell I was going to get through this lot, when a Jordanian official looked up, saw my passport and asked English? I nodded and he held out his hands for my passport, I tossed it over the heads of the crowd he stamped it and tossed it back and I was off much to everyone elses disgust ( lovely people Jordainians :smiley: )
Sinbin- Rita some time back you mentioned my name and a diesel leak problem, I think you must be mixing me up with Gavin GS no one knows about my diesel problem - until now. For quite a long time we did not use belly tanks, we were delivering to a firm whose name has become somewhat notorious of late (public enemy No 1 even) they used to give us 2 or 3 45gall barrels full which we would pump out on the way home and chuck the barrels out. I often wondered if these were the so called markers across the desert :unamused: :unamused: :unamused: When we did decide to go for belly tanks we had seen the problems some other drivers had with leaks so we decided on pumps ( thinner lighter tanks and more controlable flow) so our tanks had a huge 24v pump on the front. One trip I got back to Adana at night when it was rainig so I decided to leave refueling until the morning, in the morning it was still raining so I decided to leave it a bit longer and got right over Tarsus before the weather brightened up so I stopped went to put the hose in my tank but it had gone along with the electric lead and plug I worked my way back to the tank to find a hole about 10 inch diameter and an empty tank :blush:
I then realised why I had had such an easy run over Tarsus, no suicidal tonkas trying to pass :unamused: Next stop had to be Bulgaria - and it was. Turks got no sense of humour have they :unamused: Later I was loading in Austria when a driver who had been at Adana turned up, he asked ā€˜how did you get on going over Tarsus? It was like a bloody skid pan when I came over.’
I told him honestly it was alright when I went over :unamused: This is the first time I’ve told this do you think I’ll be O.K.?

Hi Gavin

Dont recall that must troll back to find what I said ,was it on the Astran thread or on another ,was it in general discussion on a deisel spilling problem Im sure you wouldnt have wasted the owner drivers liquid gold.

Roger Haywood

well a lot of names here i rember and have been reading about lol hows everyone doing i am not driveing now after a smash on a bike about 5 years back but back on the bikes lol and ok except for some head probs lol i am not mad they told me , wll will have to find some pics now i supose was mostly on greece etc done a seller down to shaybah with nick and went on to do a bit of russia after that catch you all up on here

sinbin31:
Hi Gavin

Dont recall that must troll back to find what I said ,was it on the Astran thread or on another ,was it in general discussion on a deisel spilling problem Im sure you wouldnt have wasted the owner drivers liquid gold.

Roger Haywood

Hi Roger it was mentioned in a general conversation IIRC nothing nasty - no offence taken - it just jogged my memory.
Gavin