Hi All
Got some of the pics off the camera sorry about the quality of some the one’s of Bob have made me sad as these did not come out to well seems to be a distance problem with the camera but enjoy,
On a sad note see you all on friday as we wish Bob a fond fairwell
Roger
Roger Haywood
Very sad news, Asian Transport/Astran was founded in 1964, the year l was born. All these years & the company is still held in such awe, & still holds such legendary status. How many of us have been parked in Dover waiting to board, parked next to a Astran Scania/Merc, with our load of groupage for Italy or Spain, & wished we were going to Doha etc, I know l have.
I am halfway through reading your book Ash, fantastic, you should be proud of yourself, as l suspect Bob Paul was. You have paid him & everyone that ever worked for, or is still pulling for Astran the ultimate compliment by writing it.
I never knew Bob Paul, but what a true gentleman he sounds. He realised the importance of people, & he understood them, & clearly this is why everyone that did have the honour & privelage of working with or for him loved & respected him so much. He proved that nice people can come first, & that if you treat people like human beings & not fleet numbers, its amazing what they will do for you. This is a lesson that todays (so called!) transport mnagement, who know the cost of everything but the value of nothing, would do well to learn!
R.I.P. Bob Paul
Chris/ADR
I was coming home eastbound along the A14 on Saturday between 6 and 7 pm and spotted an Astran trailer with 3 others parked up, It looked like a Seymors unit in front of a blue euroliner, Anyone know if a few are away to the taplines last weeekend
Hi Alison Frank just phoned said he phoned you and had a good few laf,s he was on the fone for over an hour then cursed ME for using his time .Carn,t win eh All the best Bazz
truckerash:
SheepLady:
Terry Brake owned Sandtrans.
Leo Smith got him into it.
Barbara ran the office and trucks.ooooh get you! I knew someone would know who ran it. See you soon
if i remember rightly, jim baigent had a coffee perculator and made some great tasting coffee.
truckerash- i found my old pictures, whats the best way to put some on(remember your talking to a computer illiterate here) 
rob
Badger
Hi mate if u have a printer linked too your comp scan the pics to your comp open a photo bucket acc then transfer all the pics to photo bucket then load seperately each pic which leaves you room for some words on the pic hope this helps ,its take time to get it right but once you have it its easy good luck
Roger Haywood
Im sitting here in my hotel room in doha, just done a trip down to doha, gearbox went on my truck, big time in hufhof about 3 hrs from doha, within the same day two other brits, dave and john on for astran had come out from doha where they had just delivered ,from after a big punch across the desert.One collected the trl and went on and delivered it, the other towed me on a bar to doha to graham also an astran man who has a garage there, i cant get a box here so i am going back to the uk to sort one, which already another astran man keith has offered to take out for me, then grahams men will fit it for me, The point to all this well i think mr paul would be proud of the men who have carried on his work and his ethics and spirit after he had gone, never met the man but i think he would have approved. thanks to all of you guys ps, sooner or later i will find mt own way there newboy!
Richmond, are you the guy with the 143, plain white?
Sure you have posted up some pics before!! 
Yeah thats me, i havent posted ant pics but i think someone else may have, i am not that good on the computers !or reading road signs in arabic…i keep taking wrong turns ! in daman and huf hof
bazz2752:
Hi Alison Frank just phoned said he phoned you and had a good few laf,s he was on the fone for over an hour then cursed ME for using his time .Carn,t win eh All the best Bazz
He did Bazz… I’m waiting to hear from him and have an update on a task I set for him!! 
richmond:
Yeah thats me, i haven’t posted ant pics but i think someone else may have, i am not that good on the computers !or reading road signs in arabic…
Have you got a camera this time?? If so, get some pics taken and knock us up a quick diary whilst your chilling out in the sunshine!! 
There is plenty of interest from all of us here!!
Mind you don’t take anymore wrong turns though…you could end up being fitted for an orange jump suit!!! 
Out of interest, for those of us who havent a clue, what was the route you took to get there??
If you send me a message i will give you my facebook details and you can lift some photos from there i cant work it out and my wife puts them on fb,Loaded notttingham, dover dunkerqe france ,belguim, germany, i was feeling brave, austria, hungary, romania, bulgaria, greece, turkey, syria, jordan, saudia, wrong turn in daman, again, wrong turn in hofhof, again,then into qatar, waiting at airport now for flight home, got a few picks on fb,.I havent posted on here as i only done a few trips and i think that im the newest member of the gang so im the newboy.
I for one think that it would be very interesting to hear about the experiences and thoughts of a new boy (as you put it),also the contrasts between what has already been written,and doing the job in 2010
richmond:
If you send me a message i will give you my facebook details and you can lift some photos from there i cant work it out and my wife puts them on fb,Loaded notttingham, dover dunkerqe france ,belguim, germany, i was feeling brave, austria, hungary, romania, bulgaria, greece, turkey, syria, jordan, saudia, wrong turn in daman, again, wrong turn in hofhof, again,then into qatar, waiting at airport now for flight home, got a few picks on fb,.I havent posted on here as i only done a few trips and i think that im the newest member of the gang so im the newboy.
How come you went from Bulgaria to Turkey via Greece? …or was that one of the times you took a wrong turn.
Hi Ron
I used to do that to miss out Kapic but is it so much of a problem now wouldnt have thought so ,If I was going now I would take the ferry from Italy to Greece then to Turkey less border’s. but all to his own.
Have to calculate fuel cost overland to greek border as to ferry costs to greek turkey border shouldnt think there was much in it.
Roger Haywood
You are free on astran to go which ever way you want to, so long as you dont take too long about it, ! most do go italy to greece via the ferry, but it is dear at £1000 for the ferry, £250 for frejus plus french and italian tolls,If you loaded in italy obviously you would go that way, before this i used to do rumo and bulgy and i am happy to go that way when i can, i hate kapicula, still, bloody nightmare of a place, still, .I think its is cheaper to go eastern block, but it does depend on where you load from, bear in mind in my short time i have loaded uk. once, italy and spain and holland.
Wow…Richmond…You guys must be running over weight, with all of that extra running money you need to carry Not like the good ole days eh Roger…
By the time you add the German road tolls and the extra time and money lost through all those borders involved in going eastern block I would’nt think there’s much in it costwise adding in the mileage involved and lack of cheap diesel as it used to be.
There isnt really any borders now until you get to turkey !,I dont have lots of running money as i go the long way around.
I seem to recall that back in the old days (mid 70’s) there was a trailer tax in Greece and that was the main reason that I never went via Greece. Am I right about that tax?
The only time I went into Turkey through Ipsala was in my “hippy Days” with a pack on my back but that was in a previous life - so to speak pre wagon driving days.