Haulin' Ass back to Canada

Illinois State Pen

This is an oldie

Little rural town

Little church in a little rural town

Okay we left off in Fargo, North Dakota.....................

Next day i drove down to South Beloit, Wisconsin and had a scorching hot shower and some meatball kabobs in the J (not at the same time, good idea though)

The following morning was an early start (04:00) as i wanted to beat the traffic into Chicago, get into the customer early then be cheeky and ask to be unloaded early. Luckily everything went to plan and i got tipped an hour early and there was a bonus. This place had a truck wash and they would wash my trailer out for $35 (and give me a reciept so i could claim the money back from H&R)

I wasnt too impressed with the washout, there was a bit of blood left in the back and the washout guy (East European i think) was pretending not to speak english. I had to think quickly and used the international sign language for a dirty trailer, i dipped my finger in the mess and stuck it in his face, this resulted in a smile and a squirt and the offending gunge was gone.

I sent a message to the USA dispacher to say i was good to go but i got a message to scoot round to the local trucker haunt and wait for further instructions. By this time i was getting pretty hungry anyway and drooling at the thought of some sunn eggs, crispy bacon, homefries and a bit of Texas bread, not forgetting coffee.

Anyway got round to the truckstop and there was a H&R truck already in there so i banged on the door to see if i knew them, haha, guess what, it was Don Humphrey. I did an article about him in December, anyway we went in the restaurant and stuffed our faces with the aforementioned eggs, bacon, home fries and toast, oh yes and about 5 or 6 cups of coffee.

After about 10 minutes another H&R driver came in and did excactly the same, this was Rick, another Canadian driver.

After the breakfast binge we went back to our respective chariots and i fell asleep for an hour, only to be woken up by the computer beeping with my next job. This was about 150 miles away right down in the deepest, rurallest, onehorsetowniest, hillbillyest (okay you get the picture) corner of Illinois, i didnt realise Illinois had parts like that but it was great.............

and the accent was great too, like a cross between Bennie from Top Cat and Musky from Deputy Dawg. If there is anyone from out there i didnt mean that in a nasty way, it really does sound great, i wish i could speak like that. I bet you all have great fun at parties breathing helium and talking, look i can say that coz i have a funny accent too 8¬)

Anyway i picked up the load from a place called Beardstown, and i was so surprised, i expected everyone to walking round in cheap disguises but i was wrong. Actually i camped out there last night and this morning when i drove out i could really see how beautiful the place was. One thing really struck me though, that area is so much like rural England.

So the load was collected and im heading back to Canada, im in a turnout (layby) tonight as i am pushing the miles as hard as i can and i'll do the same again the next 2 days s i can drop this trailer, reset and get back down into the States.

Ive included a couple of older pics for ya.