Adventures of a Flatbedder at Roehl

Sorry all, was busy this week and just didn't feel like updating.

Let's see, after Maine I headed to Connecticut and picked up a preloaded trailer. Got to the shipper near midnight with 10 minutes left on my clock. I found my BOL with another loaded Roehl BOL. I didn't look closely and took wrong ones and then had to back track to get the correct ones. Then dropping trailer and searching for loaded trailer. Man that sucked, it took me 45 minutes to actually find the trailer and park next to it to go to sleep.

Of course this was Friday night, so get up Saturday morning with Security Guard telling me how to get out of the place. Getting their bobtail was easy, leaving with the trailer wasn't. Had to hug the rear of the building for 1/2 mile. Tightest spot was about 12 feet wide and it was on a corner. Didn't hit anything and got out, but man they could have parked trailer in an easier spot.
So this was a two stopper, one near Syracuse and the next near Buffalo. Sat at the small Pilot in Syracuse from Saturday night until Monday morning. Dropped there and then headed to Buffalo. Easy drops!
Next was a pickup just south of Buffalo. No signs, no directions, and no idea where I was heading. Was on NY 5 South and noticed a loaded lumber truck heading North and another MT Flat headed South on this side street. I needed to be on this side street. After turning around 5 miles south and back tracking, I found the entrance and found shipper. This load was headed to Maryland. Anyone know a good way from Buffalo, NY to MD? There aren't any good ones. What is about a 5 hour drive in a straight line on an interstate was an 8 hour drive on state highways and the all hating US 322. I also do not like PA 153. There were spots where I was only going 20 MPH up hill and one spot where I was in 6th gear uphill. Yes, I was crawling!
Anyway, get to MD, deliver and now back north to Coatesville, PA. cont...

 

Got to Coatesville and waited for 2 hours to load. Was behind 7 other trucks (2 Roehl trucks) and lunch time. So get loaded and headed towards Green Bay. Running out of time on the turnpike and I look at where I can stop. Blue Mountain service area is next. Get there with 15 minutes left and.... It's closed. Next rest area is 31 miles away. Roehl is not big with sitting on the side of the road and there aren't really any "safe" places to stop so I guess I am going over 14 hours. Get to the next service area, get parked and went over by 20 minutes. Man that sucked.
So get up to Green Bay and deliver. Head back down to Neenah to pick up a relay headed home! Guess heading home was lucky for me because the 3 other Roehl drivers that were in Green Bay were all sitting in Neenah waiting for a load.
My load had me going to Sauk Centre, MN. So I get just across the border into MN and have to shut down at the Rest area just pass the Weigh Station, I start looking closely at where I am going and how I am going to get there. My custom is to get near the consignee and then use my phone to narrow down the loaction so that I know exactly where I am going. So I look at the BOL, St Cloud, MN. HHMMM, Sauk Centre, MN and St. Cloud, MN are nowhere near each other. Wonder if its a mistake by the planner. Send a msg to night dispatch, MISTAKE! Get a stupid response saying, you should have checked this before and you'll have to figure it out tomorrow with your FM. WHAT T %#^%? Could the response have been any more unprofessional and just downright rude? Was so PO'ed that I almost sent a smart ##### answer back, but I left it alone. Get up in morning, drive to St. Cloud and call in to see what's up. "Will get a msg to your FM. Call back in 15 if you don't get a call." 20 mins go by and no call. All the while I am researching on my phone where this consignee is. Finally find it, wasn't on Google or any other map software, but did find it in the local yellow pages with a map of where to go. Call my FM.... Uh OH, power outage in Marshfield and can't get a hold of him. Oh well, let's see if I am right with yellow pages and wrong city on load assignment and BOL.
Long story short, delivered it just fine and then sat for 3 hours waiting for power to come back in Marshfield and what did they want me to do from there. Got the word to head back to St. Paul and have a nice weekend.
All I can say is on this outing I finally got some decent miles.

 

Yep, that was it. And finding it at night was the easy part, finding where the trailer was, now that was the hard part. It wasn't where they normally park the loaded trailers, but back along the building right next to the creek. Couldn't find the night security guard either so that made it that much harder.