The story so far

Last time I posted, I had been helping out at the hatchery picking eggs up, after that I spent three weeks delivering chicks. During this period I was going on ride alongs with live haul drivers so the transition from chick truck driver to live haul driver would be almost seamless. Sunrise had planned to finish a driver, then move me across to live haul driving the old Kenworth. However a higher authority had a different plan. At the end of August, their 2010 volvo was rolled onto its roof, the driver escaped with minor cuts and bruises, but the truck, trailer and load of chickens wasn't as lucky. The truck was a total loss, the trailer was rebuilt into a turkey liner and most of the modules which were on the trailer were bent beyond repair. The driver had his nephew in the truck, who also had a lucky escape with only a minor cut. Carrying passengers is totally against company policy, so the driver was fired. So all this meant I got my position on live haul two weeks earlier than I expected. After many phone calls Sunrise managed to acquire a rental truck for me from Ryder in Calgary. It was a vermillion red freightliner columbia!!!  During September we had a trip back to the UK, it was good seeing family and friends again, but it made us realise we had done the right thing moving out to Alberta. Before we left for the UK, I was told that Sunrise had bought a brand new volvo to replace the wrecked one, and that i would be getting it. During the last week of September, the new truck was delivered. And what a truck it is. Its a 2012 volvo twin bunk sleeper, it has the office pack, so i have the bottom bunk set up as a table and two chairs, built in fridge freezer, cb factory fitted, big big bunk heater, 3000 watt inverter, shore power, leather seats, walnut effect plastic dash! (it can't all be perfect) and all the other boring stuff behind the switches (no qualcom is good too). The truck is limited to 117 kph and the boss doesn't mind us doing it when the need arises. It has a 15 liter cummings 500 bhp and a fuller 18 spd, so its a pretty sweet set up, at 40,000 km its starting show real potential for being a good puller. The other odd thing is how unusual it is to work for someone again who buys their trucks and cares for them. It's been serviced four times in 40,000 kms, they spent nearly $2000 having half fenders fitted to protect the paint work! They pay for diesel additive and insist we use it, and any problems with the truck it goes straight in. As for the job, what can i say, picking up live birds is definately not for everyone, I did it for a long time in the UK and love it, and i plan to do it for a long time here too.