Anyone take a break from trucking?

taking time off now. having new engine put in.

 

If you’re in a semi busy area or God forbid an actual really busy area, and you put in the time that we as OTR drivers put in, you will make actually more money driving Uber. If you’re willing to be out there in the morning, midday, evening hours, taking breaks when you feel like it. You can make $100,000 a year now as an Uber driver. And that’s after expenses.

 

I take as many as I can afford. On a 10 day break now. I’ve worked as much as physically possible for over 40 yrs. I’m wore out.

 

Yes quite a few years ago I decided to take a break from trucking not a holiday but just got out of the industry all together, and thought I'd give Taxi driving a try. I used to work for one of the largest transport companies in Australia called Linfox, Australia's equivalent to JB Hunt I guess, only totally owned by Lindsay Fox so not publicly listed, one of his distribution points was Coca Cola out at Northmead in Sydney's outer western suburbs this was I believe his very first contract. And every day I'd set out in an 8 pallet Volvo straight truck or (Rigid) as we call them over here delivering Coca Cola to various corner stores, and fast food (take away) restaurants. This was pretty hectic not only having to deal with the traffic, but doing up to 40 deliveries in one day was very taxing. So yeah I'd had enough of that. So got my taxi license and started driving ah I thought now all that stress is behind me, I soon discovered though that dealing with people was much tougher, so now not only did I still have to deal with traffic congestion but now I also had to deal with obnoxious passengers, for example if they told you "to the airport driver" and I drove without asking they'd often say "why are you going this way for driver" and then if I did ask the preferred route I'd get the smart reply back "Don't you know how to get there?" or "take the shortest route driver" So no matter what you did you always got some kind of smart response sometimes I felt like saying "yes i'm going this way so I can get an extra $10 out of you on the fare" in the end I just had to give it up, what we earned was not worth the stress, truck driving actually paid much better income and was I found far less stressful.

 

When I hire drivers I try to push them to take more time off. Most seem comfortable with 3-1 work to off schedule. This leaves 12 weeks off a year.

I personally take about 10, one week long dirt bike trips. I also take longer if I break an arm or something lol. My girlfriend who also drives works hard then takes about 6 weeks off in spring and another 6-8 weeks around Christmas/January.

 

I have a question, but I don't know where to post the question to receive replies ....Help.

 

He did deliver soft drinks in Melbourne in the 1950's but not sure it was Coke. I am pretty sure his first big contract was Coles out of Port Melbourne, I drove trucks to the same delivery points as his trucks in the mid 1970's. He got Coke a fair bit after that. He also used to deliver for Ansell Rubber, a female truck driver had the back doors come open on her delivery truck back in the 70's and a lot of condoms fell on the road in the Melbourne CBD. I remember it clearly. I actually employed her as a trainer when I worked for DECA in the 1990's

 

thats the beauty of being alive. Chasing death in as fun of a way as possible

 

No NEMT for me! I flew down to tri-cities airport to get a "excellent condition" E250 wheelchair van. I was kinda stoked to add this to my business. But this thing was a POS and it was the max I was willing to invest. So any van that I would want would be 20 to 30k and I see no ROI possible.

I'm out. Unless someone makes a class 8 wheelchair van I have lost interest.