Tuesday, June 8, 2010

Jamestown & Emporium Nightmares

After Jessie's Graduation party, we made our way on down the road to Sydney, Oh to get our load of foam delivered to the good people of Whirpool. I was in the factory and was able to see the end part of the conveyor belt and it is mind boggling to see refrigerators, one after the other constantly rolling by on that belt. Do they really sell that many? I can't imagine it. And that's just one brand. Think of all the others in the world and it's hard to believe that every day there are that many of anything that gets sold.

From there, we came back into Indiana to Fort Wayne and picked up a load heading to Jamestown, Ny. This was a hazmat load but we do a lot of those so it wasn't anything special. The special part was waiting for us when we made the delivery. Once again, our carrier instructed us to be there at a time when the consignee was not even open yet. Luckily there was an empty lot across the street and we parked there and got some good sleep in a non moving truck. The best!

When the warehouse opened, we checked in and got to special part number 2. Their dock was located inside. Uphill. In a tiny narrow space just big enough for us to get in. And we had to block the street while we were backing in. Fun times.

That accomplished, it was time for special part number 3. This was mostly special for John. The place we delivered to was doing experimental research on the new International Windstar trucks. They are beautiful unique looking trucks. Apparently they are having issues with running hot so this place was figuring out a solution to the problem and that is the reason we were there. We brought them 4 55 gallon barrels of coolant. They gave John a tour of a couple of the trucks and he was a happy boy.

The downside to all of this is that we were predispatched on two more loads and due to the delays getting this one delivered, there was no way we were going to make our next pickup on time. I called dispatch and advised them and they said don't worry about it, just get there as quick as you can.

We finished up and headed out to Emporium, Pa. What a freaking nightmare. Up up up into the twisting winding moutain roads. I think our average speed was probably around 45 mph. This isn't good when you are trying to make up for lost time. We did our best and found the place, got loaded and headed out.

We were so far behind schedule now that we knew we definitely couldn't make the next pick up on time either so again I contacted dispatch and relayed the information. Their answer was again, just get there as quick as you can. We were both getting grumpy because this meant no time to stop to eat and bathroom breaks were kept to a minimum and very rushed.

We made it to our delivery in East Syracuse, NY and things went pretty smooth there. We immediately headed out to the next pickup in Albany, NY. This one was a swap with another driver who had a load going to Canada. Only, the driver doesn't go to Canada. So we agreed to take it.

We met the driver at a cross dock and got the freight off their truck onto ours. We headed out then to St. John, NB. Hopefully, all will go well as we haven't been to this part of the country before.

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