Day 3, Thayngen - Bellinzona.
Got up a little after six, made the bed and sorted the cab before having a wash then going for coffee. I was at the agent’s office for them opening at 07:00 and the girl checked over my papers and said it should be done in an hour and to return then. I headed back to the truck and made some scrambled eggs and coffee for breakfast and returned to the agent after one hour.
She told me that she hadn’t done the clearance because I was delivering to Unilever - Best Foods and they do their own clearances. That is very unusual for Switzerland and as far as I can remember is the first time I’ve cleared direct with a company here. In the past I’ve delivered to big Swiss national companies such as Swiss Air and Swiss Telecom and even they didn’t do there own clearances. Still there is a first time for everything but I wish she had told me earlier as I could have saved an hour.
Now, as I wasn’t clearing, I just needed to visit the Transit office, fill in one form, and visit first the German then the Swiss customs to have the papers stamped. This took five minutes then the last job before going through the border is to visit the road tax machine. When you register for the Swiss tax system you are given a credit card sized card with all your details on and you put this in the machine first. The machine then asks you to enter some details, kilometre reading and then your weight. You have two options here: yes I am at, or over, the Swiss limit of 34 tonnes or no I am under 34 tonnes. This your permitted gross weight and not the actual weight you are at this time an as my truck is plated at 31 tonnes I choose option two and I then have to enter the correct weight for this vehicle. Even though when I registered this truck on the system they were quite happy with it being 31 tonnes I do get questioned by customs officials a lot. Next it asks your method of payment, cash or fuel card. I select fuel card and it spits the tax card back out and I insert my Euroshell card, it reads the details then gives me that back. A final screen displays all the information and if it’s correct you press OK and it prints your ticket.
Back to the truck, drive to the exit barrier and present the form I filled in in the transit office and the tax form to the Swiss guy in his little booth, this is where the fun starts.
“This is wrong,” he says indicating the tax form, “you are 40 tonnes, park over there and go and make a new one.” “No it is correct.” I say showing him the V5 with the plated weight on it." “No it looks like 40 tonnes, you must make a new one. Parking, now!” I point to a Swiss truck near by and ask him. “What is the maximum weight of that Swiss truck?” “34 tonnes,” he says. “Well it looks like 40 tonnes to me.” I said. “Doesn’t matter, parking NOW!” “No,” I replied “please get your Chef here now because I am not moving.”
Note - I didn’t ask him to get his cook, Chef is a common term for the boss over here. “I will call the Chef, first you park.” “No, you get the Chef first, then we will talk about parking” I replied. He had gone a funny shade of red by this point but to be fair he did make the phone call. A few minutes of rapid fire discussions took place then he hung up. “Show me your truck papers again,” he asked. I did and he studied the V5 for a couple of minutes, then he stamped the tax form to show it had been checked, that should save me having more problems at the Italian border, and said I could go. “Go,go or go parking?” I enquired innocently. “Go,go just go,” he shouted, so figuring I had pushed my luck far enough and a little concerned, because that shade of red can’t be healthy, I did as requested. I don’t think there is anything that annoys me more than officials that don’t know there job.
In Thayngen heading to Best foods to tip.
800 metres through the border, on the right, was the road I needed and a further 500 metres brought me to the truck entrance to Best Foods. The woman on the gate directed me to goods in and showed me were to park. I reported to the goods in office and the guy there made a phone call to the contact name I had to check where I was to unload. Hanging up he asked if I had a tail-lift and when I said I had he asked me to drop the three pallets outside an office building on the opposite side of the yard. After tipping I went back to get the CMR signed, I also got him to add a separate signature next to where I had written the T-form number to acknowledge receipt of it, that way should it go missing I have proof of handing it over. Then as I was leaving he thanked me and gave me a bag of free samples, they do Liptons and Knorr products. Back in the cab I emailed the POD details back to the yard and while that was going through had a look in the bag he had given me. There was a fair old selection of stuff in there: packets of soup, boxes of stock cubes, packets of seasoning for steaks and chops, packets of stuff that makes up into marinades and then horror of horrors right at the bottom of the bag was a box of tea bags! Not only are they tea bags but they are lime flavour tea, not even any caffeine in them. What the heck am I going to do with 100 lime flavoured tea bags? Can this day get any worse, arguments with customs and tea bags within the space of twenty minutes? I need a large coffee!
On the road again I head towards Zürich and cut through the city towards Luzern and then between Zug and Luzern I pick up the road towards the Gotthard tunnel. I’ve written about this road before as it is one of my favourites but I usually travel it northbound so it makes a nice change to be heading the other way and get a different view of the scenery.
A couple of views from my favourite road.
Road works Swiss style, this guy kept me here for over five minutes
As I rejoin the motorway after the small town Flüeln I join the queue for the tunnel control and sit in it for just under an hour without moving then spend another twenty minutes crawling towards the head of the queue before getting the green light to proceed.
The first picture is as I joined the back of the queue and the second is the light control at the front
At the next exit the overhead signs are illuminated directing all trucks to take the slip road and to slow to 50 km/h. There is a weighbridge sunk into the road surface at the bottom of the slip and a sort of control tower over on the left, by the time you get to the top of the slip the tower have radioed the policeman standing there and he either waves you back onto the motorway or directs you down into the motorway maintenance yard for further weighing. I only have two pallets on weighing 180 kgs so it is straight back onto the motorway and the start of the climb to the tunnel.
The signs directing all trucks over the weighbridge, the control tower is masked by the bushes on the right of the on slip.
As well as the truck which was sent for further weighing two others directly in front of me in the queue had pulled into the services so with open road and being lightly loaded I am really getting a move on on the first part of the climb until I catch up with other trucks further up, there is no overtaking for trucks on the entire climb.
Climbing towards the Gotthard tunnel. That’s not it in the picture, that is one of the many smaller ones.
This is to prove my undoing because when I get to the top and the second light control at the tunnel entrance, where each truck is held until the one in front is 150 metres ahead, instead of getting the green light I’m directed into the small parking area on the left where a police car and two officers are waiting for me.
It turns out I was clocked at 87 km/h further down the hill when the limit is 80 km and they are keen to relieve me of some hard earned cash, 300 Swiss francs (£115) in fact. I have no Swiss Francs with me apart from a few coins so he says he can take Euros and it will be €202 (£136) but on checking my wallet I only have €140 which isn’t enough. Spotting the plastic in my wallet he tells me I can pay by VISA and produces one of the old style swipe machines from the car. He called in on his radio to check my card number and get an authorisation code and then with one quick swipe I make a 300 Franc donation to the Swiss Policeman’s Ball. I’m blaming the tea bags as I had a feeling it was going to be a bad day when I found them.
OUCH!!!
They are finished with me now and hold the traffic so I can rejoin the road and make my way through the tunnel. Back out of the tunnel into the sunshine and the motorway continues south through the Italian speaking region of Switzerland. At Bellinzona services I need a toilet break so pull in and stop for thirty minutes before continuing on to the border at Chiasso.
The customs compound at Chiasso, best described as organised chaos. In the centre of the pictures you can see some of the trucks on the Italian side waiting to enter Switzerland. In the background the road on stilts is the motorway in Italy which you climb up to from the border.
Empty trucks can bypass the compound and use the ‘Vuoti’ (Empty) border.
The queue isn’t too bad and while inching forward I fill in the form required here, I try to keep a few blank forms in my briefcase as it can save time by filling them out in advance. After queuing for ten minutes I get parked and go into the customs building, everything goes smoothly and within ten minutes I am back in the truck and crossing into Italy.
From here it’s just under an hour to the last drop on the south-eastern corner of Milan and the last two pallets are unloaded as soon as I arrive and I take another fifteen minute break here to go with the thirty I took at Bellinzona then, after emailing the final POD, set off back to Switzerland.
Unloading at the last delivery in San Giuliano Milanese, I just parked in the street and they came out on the fork-lift to take the two pallets off
Less than two and a half hours after entering Italy I’m back at the border and because I’m empty this time I can avoid going down to the compound and instead go through the lane for empty trucks at the car border, stopping briefly to visit the road tax machine.
I phone the yard to see when they want me to load and if the company we load from want three trailers tomorrow the third is mine and if not I will be first on Thursday morning.
Back at Bellinzona services I call it a day and park up at 19:30. I go and use the shower then make something to eat, liver and onions with cauliflower, broccoli and carrots tonight. I log into TruckNet to keep up to date then read for a while before turning in. I don’t know what tomorrow has in store but I’m going back up that mountain slower than today, that’s for sure.
8 hours 9 minutes driving today and 516 km covered.
