A long long time ago I was in the same boat as many of you…Dreaming of the day I would finally be driving a lorry, I worked my way up the ladder, starting right at the bottom, with crap lorries, low wages and working at jobs that nobody wanted.
It all paid off though, it was a long hard slog and it was a good few years until I got my first decent job, with a lorry that I liked and decent wages at the end of the week, after that I started doing international work, I’d finally got there.
From starting off in a Transit Luton, on to a 7.5t, then a 16t, then artics that had been rescued from a scrap yard, I got the new motors, including driving big V8 Scanias all over Europe and beyond, I now drive all over Canada and the USA in a blinged up Peterbilt, so keep the faith and hang in there, my dreams have come true, your dreams may be a little different, but you can make them happen if you work at them.
Thanks for the encouragement! The diaries of the coast to coast to coast trips in 361 are a great read and give insight to the differences (and some similarities) to trucking in N. America and Europe.
I made the journey the other way, moving from Canada to the UK over 20 years ago and deciding at an ‘advanced’ age (50+) to get into driving. I’m only still just getting started but as you say, it’ll happen if you stick with it!!
WOW What a story mate you truely are an insparation to us all and well done yep i know what you mean starting at the bottom although i have had a few good trucks up till now and only the 1 bad one so i have been lucky i suppose … but i start on tipper work tonight that should be a laugh . .
Hi Laz like you mate im in that 50s+ bracket but it does not deter me at all I should have done the test yrs ago though even though i had a good job It would have saved time nowadays .
I thought that some of you lot may find my little stories interesting, I know I would’ve done when I was starting out, I used to read TRUCK magazine and the first thing I would do with each new issue was turn to the Long Distance Diaries, hearing tales of drivers running into Europe, down to the Middle East or across the USA, sitting there and dreaming of the day when I could do the same.
I’m just a normal bloke, I always wanted to drive a lorry and when I started out in my little Transit Van I was waiting for the day that I turned 21 so I could drive a proper lorry, as I said before, I took every crappy job that I could, I never said no to anything, if it involved driving, I was happy, I even drove a Honda Acty van for a while and that’s about as far removed from a real lorry as you can get, but by hanging in there I now drive this
It’s been a long hard slog, for sure, but I got there in the end, just goes to show that anything is possible
What a great blog very inspiring. I am waiting to find out if my PR visa for Canada is accepted and hope to be out there next year. Any advice for a new driver looking for work in BC would be very much appreciated!
Capsaicin:
What a great blog very inspiring. I am waiting to find out if my PR visa for Canada is accepted and hope to be out there next year. Any advice for a new driver looking for work in BC would be very much appreciated!
The best advice I can give you is to wait until May to come out here, it’s bloody freezing before that
Put a post up on the expats forum, you’ll get replies from others that have done it too, not just me, it may be a lot more helpful to you
In my experience alone, I have found that if you work your arse off and you don’t listen to all the tossers who put in the snide remarks and try put you down that the opportunities will always be there in the end. I took a risk in going to college last year as I was doing things that were new to me that in my eyes were unknown. Never done a creative subject before, but I decided to do photography as I like getting pictures of trucks so I thought yep that might work. Funny enough I was speaking to a transport manager about this yesterday who asked me to go down when I get my results to see how I got on, My first ever project at college for photography, was to do a photo shoot of things that look like all letters of the alphabet A-Z. We were sent round college to get pictures and not even 20 minutes into it, I threw in the towel it was just too ■■■■■■■ boring!! So I went back to the classroom and said if I could do the photo shoot over the weekend as I just weren’t liking the project round college She said it was okay to do so, thankfully I knew that I would be going down to the yard with dad so camera was ready, spare batteries and clean SD card which I had to replace couple weeks later due to the thing breaking Who would have thought you could get all the letters of the alphabet using nothing but trucks and trailers Going back to college I didn’t have the contact sheets printed with all thepictures on as I didn’t have a printer or photoshop available. She asked about them, and when I said i have them i just need to print them out I instantly I got the ’ Yeah alright then pull the other one ’ Well she got the shock of her life to find I filled 9 pages of contact sheets
You will be wondering why I’ve just gone on about my first project, well since then I’ve not looked back. I’ve worked my arse off even though in another thread I said I didn’t even count it as work because to be honest I don’t. I’ve been given opportunity after opportunity and I’ve only worked on it for a year! I have the respect of 3 transport firms, I was allowed to go with my mate Steve to purfleet to get some snaps and have a day out in the truck and yesterday I had a discussion with a transport manager of where I did a photoshoot, I’ve been given the all clear as to if I ever need pictures or want to get pictures to just call in and the fact he loves the work that I’ve done and has some of my work framed up in his office it shows on its own my hard work has paid off, Infact that good I missed out one whole bit out of the projects (Abstract photography) and I still got an A So if you never give up, and you stick at it you will get where you need to be
Eventually, I will get behind the wheel of a truck and I will reach my dream one day
And my dream has developed over the years, it’s gone from the simple dream of wanting to drive a truck, to wanting to own one, to wanting to move to America, finding out i’d have to marry an american to get a chance of living there and being put off So the Dream of Canada was born and I still want to own my own truck It’s not crazy, it’s being optimistic. Pessimists see difficulty in every opportunity, Optimists see opportunity in every difficulty and that’s exactly what I do
If you work hard enough, and never give up. You will get to where you need to be But all the fun about getting to live your dream is the journey you take to get there.
&&&& NMM I still remember the old TRUCK magazine, do you know why they stopped it?? Or did that magazine end up as the Truck & Driver??
They stopped TRUCK magazine because nobody was buying it, simple economics, I don’t know why, it was far and away the best magazine out there, but the sales figures don’t lie
When I worked there, we put out some excellent material, but every month T&D would kick our arse in the sales league, especially when they had a really pretty truck on the cover, we at TRUCK would talk about the technical and business side of things, but people want pretty pictures of shiny trucks, so they bought T&D or that comic Trucking (They were the enemy, good magazine though)
As for the rest of your post, keep on dreaming, put in the right amount of effort and you’ll soon be living it
I still remember the one when they did about the FH12 Globetrotter can’t remember the exact article as I was only a nipper when I looked at the magazine, infact the only thing I remember was that it was a blue FH with the globetrotter (Or XL not sure which) with a 420 under the cab if my memory is that good
As for my dreams, well I advise anyone to follow their dreams, So long as it’s not a stupid one like being able to fly like superman But I’m working hard at them as I know eventually I’ll get there
… but i start on tipper work tonight that should be a laugh . 
.
bracket but it does not deter me at all I should have done the test yrs ago though even though i had a good job It would have saved time nowadays .
