Our Wedding Anniversary

When I left Fort Chiswell. I thought about stopping for the day without delivering it till the following morning, but because I was already a day behind, I decided to do a couple of extra hours and get my delivery made and get to my collection. I could get loaded while on my off time then. My reload was going to Nova Scotia, but again I was only bringing it to Woodstock.

It seems to be the norm at the moment to drop in Toronto and get a load back to the yard as most of the US runs are mainly coming out of Woodstock or Winnipeg. Most of the work coming out of Toronto is mainly Canada runs only. They let the Canada Only drivers take all those. We used to have loads of loads out of Toronto going to the US, but one of our biggest customers shut several of there Canadian plants down only leaving a few in Canada and the rest in the US, due to the recession, but it did not affect our work load. that’s where Ayr Motor was recession smart. We just adapted and took on other work to fill the gap. One of the ways was to take on more team work. We now run twice as many teams as we ever have. that’s one of the reasons why we are getting bigger by the day and trying to take on as many drivers as we can in order to expand.

Once I got to Woodstock and the truck through the shop, I then got a load to Avondale, Pennsylvania. With a reload from Hanover, Pennsylvania to St Damase, Quebec.

Not fun reversing onto a bay on a residential street

Then a reload from Joliette, Quebec, which was going to Nova Scotia, but again I was just dropping it off at Woodstock. I got back on the Thursday afternoon only been out for nine and half days covering 5100 miles this time, which is not bad but could have done better. I got held up at the Hanover pickup. Most of our loads the trailer needs to be totally clean and dry, but some of our loads are outside products. They tend to get the trailer wet and dirty. It then takes a couple of hours to clean and dry the floor as much as you can a wood floor. Its never totally dry though. So you have to wait till it is. It was raining that day which slowed it down even more. With the load I had. The trailer had to be extra dry or it would have ruined the load. By the time it was dry, my 14 hour window was over. So had to set off the next day. that’s one of the down sides to carrying multi loads.

While at home. It was mine and Emma’s wedding anniversary. So we got a baby sitter and went out on the Friday. On the Saturday I finally started on the land. Where the ground was not disturbed when the house was built. We have some grass, only about 20% of the land. It was well over grow. It took me eight hours and still not done. My next major purchase is going to have to be a ride on mower. I was shattered.

Some of the grass I still have to cut

Some of the grass I cut

I planned on doing more today. But we was invited to a friends cottage down the road. They are a retired English couple from Yorkshire, who have been here 30 plus years and still have the Yorkshire accent. They have an house a few streets behind us, but they also have a river front cottage 10mins down the road. They have all the Canadian toys like speed boat, sail boat, quad bike. Even a badminton court on the back garden.

My eldest on the back of the bike going down to the boat dock

View From the water up to the cottage

 So we had some fun playing down there. It was hard work with the kids not staying away from the water, but its something they need to learn to be around. And like other Canadian hospitality, we get to use their property even when our friends are not around. After leaving there, we went over to D&Q for supper. With the weather been 28 degrees I wanted some ice-cream. D&Q do the best throughout North America. I have always asked for the biggest portion in the UK. So I asked for a large, (which was not the biggest) when they brought it to the table, WOW how much. It came in a cup, the same size of a large drink at McDonalds. I could not move once I finished it.

Anyway my truck has shut down for the night only six and half hours away, so I’m defiantly out sometime today (Holiday Monday) a nice bonus for that. So I wonder where I’m off to next. Till next time, Bye for now.

This was at a Truck Stop. There was six of us at one point

I had fun trying to get over the George Washington Bridge