NO 8

Hi all, little old me again. Ok left off with dropping one of the ice floor trl's in at Antwerpen and then headed south for Basel in Switzerland. The trip down was ok except for the weather in the ardenns; They never clear the roads in that area and we were driving on ice and snow, with just the cab, it's not to good a drive, so got to a place called Habay not far from the Luxembourg boarder and called it a night. The next day the main road was good but trying to get off the parking lot was a bit slippy. Got to Basel later that day.


This is us parked up at the arena in Basel.

Ok loaded out and then headed north with Marcel and Bernard. Got to Luxembourg and called it a night or a morning as it was early Monday morning. There was still alot of snow about.

The next photo's are the wrong way round. This first one is about 2hours up the road from Luxembourg, its north of Namur and the snow is getting better.

Photo no 4

Photo no 3


Photo no 2



Photo no 1.

This is what it was like when we started heading north. and so on with 2 3 and 4.


Cannot remember where i took this but snowing again; Maybe it was on the way south the first time but hey ho I have slept since then.


Ok me and Marcel dropped our trl's in Antwerpen and then headed back to Nr Basel on the Germany side of the border. There were 2 of the ice floor trl's there for us, so we picked them up and headed back up to Hassel in Belgium as that was where the show was going after Antwerpen.

This next photo is of us stopped at the Luxembourg/ Belgium border. I was having a lot of problems with warning lights coming on the dash, telling me this is not working that is not working and then the arlam was going off as I was driving with all the lights flashing and that, but it kept going, Anyway stopped and reset it and on my way again, or so I thought!!!!!! No it wasn't; It went off again, 3 times i had to reset it. In the end I said "what the fuck" and just drove with them flashing away, but within maybe 10ks it settled down and all was ok again. So off we jolly trot to Hassel.

This next one was after Marcel got going. Well, 6 wheeler with mid lift are no F...ing good in snow, but we got going in the end.

And we had more snow to deal with.

Heading into the Ardens.

Still in the Ardens. See the truck tyre marks, that was from an Italian truck and he was not hanging about. We were doing about 65/ 70ks as that was ice we were driving on and well, he was gone by the time I picked up the camera.

Look at the ice it's about 1 inch thick.

Ok dropped the trl's at Hassel and had a night out. The next day headed back to the yard in Rotterdam as my girl, (The Cab) was going into the workshop to try and sort out the problems I was getting with her. Had a couple of days off. Then into Antwerpen to move the show over to Hassel. I did one trl and back again as I was doing the ice out that night. Then I took the ice floors to Brussel's as that was the next city for the next show. Did the ice out as we call it. It means I move the tlr's when they are ready to load the ice floor away, (Pics to follow of ice out)then it was bed time. Had a long sleep as there was no rush to Brussel's as it is only about 120ks there and back and had all day to do it. Well did one then after getting back to Antwerpen I was having a break and I got a phone call to do the next one then head back to M.A.N in Rotterdam as they did not sort all the old girls problems out.

The next day bright and breezy into M.A.N by 07.30hrs. Rene was the guy to try and sort her out. I know him as we had worked together before the boss's sold the container side of the company sometime back.


Sorted some of the problems out then went looking for the air leak. So over went the cab and as I live in their, there was a lot of stuff to get out first. Shit....... I got some crap in my cab but hey ho where else can i keep it but with me..


This is Rene trying to find the leak with some listening thing on his head.

Their is some of my shit on the diesel tank. I think Rene is somewhere under the truck or taking another coffee.

That's the man there after finding the leak. It's in the gearbox, so the gearbox will have to come it out and send it to ZF for repair. As it only looses all it's air when it's parked up for more then 7hrs, we agreed to do the job when it goes in for its M.O.T later this year. That sounds good for me as I will take that week off.

Ok after coming out of M.A.N, I had her washed down and then headed over to Hassel for the night as the load out was for the next day. The snow in this photo came down in about 40mns.

Thats Leon's truck over there. He must have the clap or something parking so far away. (Only joking) he was asleep.

Did the move to Brussel's, and the load in. Then headed back to Hassel for the last ice floor trl which was going to Berlin.... where I am now.

Here are some photos of the old border crossing from West to East Germany.

Coming into the west side.

A closer look at it now, it's just a service station.

Here is the watchtower on the west side. In the background behind the trees are a lot of old military buildings.

You can just see some of them in this one.

There they are.

And some more i think these ones are on the East side.

This is like no mans land. All the trucks would of parked here waiting to do customs and all that stuff. Now its one big parking lot and service stations.

This is the watchtower on the East side. Don't know why but it looks better than the one on the West side for some reason.

Just driving in the snow but not like Belgium here in Germany there is no ice on the road as they grit it.The train bridge is over a frozen river. Sorry was not fast enough to get a better photo.

Looks like a German firm has stolen our name, will pass this on to the boss. Thats dirty snow stuck to the back doors. But then I thought.... hey boss you got another company???

Ok in the arena at Berlin. Thats looking towards the way out, and behind that wall on the left is a train line but higher up as this arena is built sunken into the ground. There isn't much to look at up top.

Ok this is me parked up. To my right is the trl, to my left, is the door into the arena. That's where the guards are, and also the shower room. I got power to the truck and as you can tell a bloody good internet connection as i've now got up to date with the blog. Well...it's Sunday night and in the morning I have to put the 2 trl's inside ready for the ice floor to be unloaded. I will manage to drive one in as there's room to turn around and the second one will have to be backed in then, because of the lack of room. The tlr with the pumping station stays outside, where i am parked at the moment. Will have to put the tank tlr next to the pumping station tlr; one of the ice floor trl's have a big tank in it which is the length of the trl and they stack some of the flooring on top. (Piccy's to follow in next post to explain this procedure)

After I have done the ice floor in, it's off up to a port, north of Berlin called Rostock and wait for the show trl's to come off the boat. Have been told I will do two trl's then have to go back to Brussel's and pick up another ice floor tlr and take that to Odense in Denmark as that's where this show is going after Berlin. But all i am doing is dropping it over at Odense and heading back to Berlin to help with the move on Monday. I have been told more what i am doing in the next couple of weeks but that WILL change so will have to wait and see what happens.

So till the next time; and i hope it won't be too long this time before the next blog as it has took me all afternoon to do both this one and No7. Now its time to talk to the good looking one, so keep it sunny side up and have a good one ........

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hi, Just thought I would let all you readers out there know, that it's my sweet lovers 45th Birthday (20.02.65)

Just look at this one below. He's getting an old man now and needs his rest....Arrh... Love him.




But on a better note, he looks a bit more with it on the next one.

Cheers Babe. Just sorry I can't be with you on your special day.

Anyway Happy Birthday you balding, fat, hairy arsed, 45 year old truck driver.

Have a good one babe and you can have your present when I see you next xxx.

I'm sure all you readers will agree in wishing Bob a very Happy Birthday.

And as he says "keep it sunny side up till the next one............."

NO 7

Well Hi guy's and gal's. I know i have said on the last bloggs i will do an update, so here we go. Are you sat comfortably..........I do hope so.

Well left off in November ("shit that long ago") I was going to caz's then. Then onto Liverpool and Paris with that show. A lot has happened since then as its nearly 4mths ago. Did the Paris move all ok, Then, in my last post I said I was going to Budapest to leave a truck there for the next person coming in over there, well did not have to do that. Instead I had to take a trl back to Rotteredam where I left it. Then instead of taking this truck to Budapest, I had to take it to the UK and leave it there for another driver to take it to Ireland where there was another show there for Christmas. I then had a flight back to Madrid. The circus was going to Zaragoza from Madrid. Did two trips there, it was the last circus show and was there for a week, then time to pack it up and send it home (this is all before christmas). First we just parked the circus there on the Sunday night. Then we had to go to Barcelona for a show coming into Spain from "somewhere in the world" but cannot remember. So picked them up in Barcelona then dropped them in Madrid. It was then back to pick up the circus and take that back to Nr Rotterdam where we left it. Me and 1pk, 2pk and 3pk (3 VERY big guys) were heading to Praha for a move to Budapest on the Sunday night. I got to Praha on Saturday night very late and it was cold -12 and snowy. Dropped the show in Budapest. The "load in" there is a piece of cake as we just parked all the trl's back stage in the building and let them get on with it. As it was christmas that week I flew back to Caz's for christmas day but soon had to fly back to Budapest and move a show to Stockholm. Dropped the trl's in Rostock which is a port, north of Berlin then drove back solo to Caz's for New Year's Eve I drove back with just the cab because i was on my way to Dublin in Ireland. I had a boat booked for the 2nd of Jan very early so left Caz's on the 1st (Not much drink for me on New Year's Eve). Got to Dublin to help with the move from there to Nice in France then it was split weeks. That means two town's, two shows in one week over France. I think it went Nice - Lyon - Toulouse - Marseille - Rouen - Montpellier then it went to Geneve in Switzerland. I am getting ahead of myself here a bit, so lets take a coffee break and have a look at some of the piccys. They are of the circus in Spain.

This is me with one of our own containers. We used our own ones for the circus.

This is the camp site at Malaga and the next pic. (Robbies and my trucks) as you can see a nice and sunny day.

The one's below are of the park in the arena at Servilla.

This is what I opened my curtains to, the first Elephant's name is Baby ("thats one big baby") Once it got you'st to me it was very friendly.

Arrh... Just look at them, you feel like you can just give them a cuddle (no thanks) they just looked at me and thought..." Yummy" dinner time. But god the were beautiful. We just put the cage up for them. I think the first one is called Kena and the other Mac.

This is Winston, you had to be careful around him as well but he did like to have his ear's scratched and look out for his paws. Another one called Samson, he was so calm you put your hand up to the cage and he would smell it and lick it and then you could give him a good old scratch all over through the cage.

At the start of the show there was an opening party for all the kids. It lasted about an hour before the main show began.

Back stage waiting for the show to start.
And two of the sound guy's. Just look at that Old sound board they use!!!!!!!!! yes thats just for the sound there is another one a bit smaller for the lights.

I had to follow this on the national rds in Spain for about an hour, god it was slow but when it got out onto 2 lanes I had a job to overtake it before we were back down to one lane again. (Bugger)

The next ones are just driving though a small part of Spain.

How to ruin the view. When it is finished it will save about 15mins that's all.

Ok the next photo's are just a small part of driving through southern Spain.

Ok then lets get back to it coffee break over. Ok the week before the show went into Marseille I had to drive over to Genova in Italy and pick up a trl which was heading for Istandbul and drop that at the port of Trieste where Leon and Tony were. They got there at 6am but had to wait till 8am for the office to open to do all the custom papers. When I arrived I had to wait outside the port till they came out with the papers. So had a sleep for a bit, got up and a subby was just arriving, then two more subby's, so we were all just sat there waiting, drinking coffee as Leon and Tony did the customs. It was sorted out later in the day and the tlr's made the boat.

The next piccy is of Bernard's truck on his birthday in Nice. He was still sleeping when we did this.
This looks like an aircraft hanger but its not. Its the big doors for the arena in Nice where they have a stage when they have an open air rock band playing. If you look, there is a fence to the left of the truck where there is a big sports field.

Ok on the way back from Trieste and just before Marseille with Tony; When his truck started to make a hell of noise, lucky it was down hill and just 100 metres to the next service station so he free wheeled in there. In the end they took him away to M.A.N, Nr Nice. Don't know the full details but it ended up back in Rotterdam. His truck had to have a new motor in the end, as the oil pump had broken and somehow the front and back bearing on the crank broke and the crank was out of shape to so they had to put a new motor in it.
This is the next morning.

THIS was weird, following it down the motorway the wrong way round.

I know one thing though, I like the wreaker's speed limiter, I had a problem keeping up.

Well I went to the arena in Marseille until Sunday. Then the show was on the move to Rouen north west of France. The next pic is the change over point just south of Paris. It was a mud bath there as you can see.

Ok on our way to Rouen.

I parked next to this for a break. Nice airbrush work on this bike race truck it was a french one.

Ok we came out of Rouen and headed to Geneve in Switzerland.

The arena here is right next to the airport. This first one is parked up waiting to unload later that day. Pretty close to the runway.

Ok This is from one end of the airport the the other. If you look down the left side of the photo you will just see a blue trl just after the vans, well that will be our camp site for this one until Sunday; when it will be time to move on to Montpellier in France until mid week again, then to Basel in northern Switzerland.

Sorry no photos of that as not a well boy that week at all. Didn't know what to do first, sit on the loo or put me head in there first. Bad week that was. Anyway probably "too much information". Ok from Montpellier I took one trl to Nr Geneve and dropped it, then went back to the arena because the next day I was taking one of the 3 ice floor trl's to Antwerpen in Belgium, ready for the next show after Basel. I dropped the trl, then headed for Basel for a day off before the move to Belgium...

Ok got some more photo's of the move up to Belgium so have to do another post on that as Cazzy is blowing her cheeks out at seeing the size of this one..... Just wait till you see the next lover girl.

So till the next one keep it sunny side up and have a good one....