Indian River

I miss the heck out of that run. Naked Juice switched to a different type of product which eliminated the need for multiple loads per day and turned it into a 3 or 4 loads per week type of deal. They have a dedicated local outfit do it now I believe. That was the best run in the fleet, though. Grandview to L.A., then deadhead all the way back for another one. It went away a few years ago.

We do a lot of California to Florida. I pulled one from Turlock to Apopka last week. We also do Delano and Visalia to Florida as well.

They moved the terminal to Visalia a few years ago. It’s a pretty nice setup there with multiple shop bays, a nice office, and only 5 minutes from Hwy 99.

 

80% of my washouts are drop/hook with a clean tank already sitting there. Sometimes it’s at a terminal, sometimes at a commercial wash out facility. When I do live wash it’s around an hour, maybe 2 hours. A lot of times, you can drop it and come back later. They’ll shuttle it around with a yard mule while you go eat or whatever.

 

I don’t care for dairy loads either. I don’t pull them too often, though.

 

I haven’t logged on here in awhile. It looks like most of the questions have already been answered.

I’ve never been one to discuss the pay on here since it’s always subject to change. I’ll direct you to call the Florida office and talk to a recruiter on that. I will say that IRT has given fleet-wide pay raises at least twice, maybe even 3 times in the 4 1/2 years that I’ve worked here. I think it was 41 cents in 2016. It’s in the 50’s now, so I assume it will continue to increase. The vacation pay was $500 a week in 2016 when I started. It’s $1,000 a week now. They also set it up where you earn an additional week with each year of service. I think it caps at 3 weeks.

Detention pay varies on the situation. The days of sitting at customers for 30 or 40 hours are long gone. That hasn’t been a common thing for at least 2 or 3 years. I think the purchase of additional tanks where more customers are drop/hook took care of that. Even when I live load/unload it’s rarely more than a 10 hour break on-site which usually occurs when I need the break anyway.

I left Turlock, CA last Friday. I delivered in Apopka, Florida. Afterward, I bobtailed 22 miles to Winter Garden, FL and picked up a preloaded tank and brought it to La Crosse, Wisconsin. I’m sitting here now. My odometer shows 4,210 miles from last Friday to this Friday. You can roll steady miles here if you’re willing to work. I’m scheduled to grab one in Michigan this weekend that goes back to Florida.

Tall miles, newer Peterbilt trucks, factory fridge, factory power inverter with an 80 inch sleeper. Get fuel where you want, take your own route (as long as you don’t abuse it and go way out of route), no camera in the truck babysitting you, no pumps, no hoses, no involvement on the loading/unloading, no micromanagement, and 6 nice terminals throughout the country. December will be 5 years and I have no complaints.

 

Clovis used to be my “home terminal” when I lived in Oklahoma City. I never saw it much, though, since I’m an OTR driver.

When I moved to San Antonio in 2018, Mission became my “home terminal.” The only time I see it is when I take home time. I usually leave the house, go down there and grab a load that goes to Florida, Washington, Jersey, or California and then I never see Mission again until the next time I go home. The terminal manager there is a great guy.

As for Clovis, I don’t see it much. A lot of their loads are regional dairy. I can’t recall being in Clovis within the last 6 months. It may have even been a year. I rarely make a delivery that terminates under their dispatch umbrella, so they’re never the ones planning me on loads or dispatching me. When I run a load to Texas, 9 times out of 10, it’s to get me home. Once I’m empty and finished with my time off, Mission dispatches me out of the area, not Clovis.