Morocco.....The Country That Travels Within You.

The title for this blog post comes from the 2012, official slogan, for the Moroccan Tourist Board. I am really not sure what it actually means or how it relates to the experience of Morocco.

With the race on April 15 getting closer, the truckies have been asking questions and trying to make travel arrangements. Mine and the other truckies past experiences of driving in Morocco have been terrible. The old Tangiers port in the centre ville was very unorganised. From the moment that you drove off the ferry, you found yourself stuck in this port of corruption and chaos. You didn,t know who was a port official and who wasn,t. Your paperwork and passport was taken by these people and they just seemed to disappear into the melee. Not knowing where they had gone and how long you would be sat in the port, was just the beginning of your nightmare. And you experienced exactly the same when you returned to Tangier. That was on top of all the other problems that I encountered. I would like to tell you these stories but I do not think it is appropriate to write them down here. But if they happen again, my fingers will be moving, fast and furiously, on this keyboard. I am hoping that, for this years race in Marrakech, things SHOULD be better.

A lovely little map !

Tangiers now has a new port which has recently opened, called Tangier Med 2. It is situated 40km to the east of Tangier. Its actually closer to Ceuta, another Moroccan port. Ceuta has the same bad reputation as the old Tangier port. Whether the old regime of port officials has moved as well, only time will tell. It was not a good advert for Morocco. May be our trip through the port will be as smooth and as quick as a magic carpet ride.

Welcome to the new Tangier Med 2

The drive from Tangiers to Marrakech was actually quite pleasant, except for driving around the ring road of Rabat, which was very slow due to the volume of traffic. The street circuit of Marrakech will also be improved from 2010 with more cranes and better track staff. Its a long and arduous task for the teams to come here and then watch so many laps of a race behind a safety car. Again, I hope that this year will be a better experience for everyone.


I shall remind you all of the following words;

In shaa'Allah ( إن شاء الله‎) is an Arabic term to indicate hope for an event to occur in the future. The phrase translates into English as "God willing" or "If it is God's will"


Or as most of the western world say......................... FINGERS CROSSED !

Dont forget that you can move your cursor on to the pictures, and click on them. This will open up the lightbox and you will be able to view them much better.                                                        

No overtaking.....for 367km

0600 hours and we are arrive outside the Santa Maria entrance at Monza circuit. My friend jumps down from the truck and pushes the button to alert the security. After a few minutes, the gate slides open and we drive on through to where the truck is parked. Bags are loaded up into the cab and the truck is started. The long winded process of loading our digital tachograph cards into the tacho begins. Why this electronic piece of shit has been approved for standard fitment in trucks is beyond me. It is a slow, and sometimes, very complicated process to ensure that you select the correct information to be recorded on your digicard. Whoever sanctioned this is an idiot. We have a Siemens unit. They are also made by Actia and Stonebridge, but they all use the same useless interface.

As we start to move, a figure runs towards us. It,s one of the other teams truckies and he needs some directions to get out of the circuit. Most people use the Verdana entrance when they arrive and do not even know about the Santa Maria. The Verdana is only in use in the daytime. I have to do my usual hand waving and speaking slowly as I do not speak Hungarian.

Some teams have gone back to their bases through the Mont Blanc Tunnel or Frejus Tunnel, depending on their location in Europe. We go a different way and thankfully, we hit the Autostrada before the morning traffic rush and head back towards the Brenner Pass. As we turn on to the Autostrada del Brennero, we see the first road sign that tells us that trucks are not allowed to overtake. These are new signs and now it means that you cannot overtake for the next 367km. This overtaking ban goes right the way into Austria. I can see why it exists but not for 367km.

Its enough to make you SCREAM !!!!.

No overtaking

At least the weather is better than last time and some of the snow has melted making for some beautiful scenery. People work hard to pay to come on holiday and see this but we get paid to drive through it. NICE.

View across the south Tirol

Brenner Toll

As we go further into Austria and then Germany, the sky becomes grey, the sunshine disappears but at least we can now overtake. We have to go back to Dusseldorf to have the brakes on the trailer overhauled and repaired. Trying to find a hotel is proving to be difficult. The Autobahn hotels have rooms available but there is absolutely no place to park. Finally, we remember a hotel just before Limburg and we park up at a place that I have named "Hamburger Hill" due to its location and a big 20 metre high, McDonalds restaurant sign.

ToJa trucks in Neukirchen-Vluyn welcome us the following day with hot coffee and the promise of a quick repair .http://www.toja-nfz.de/

Wheel hub

Very expensive brake parts

Trailer suspension airbag

Brake drum

In the pit underneath the trailer

All brake problems resolved and its on up to Rotterdam though some very heavy Dutch traffic. The next race is in Spain so the truck will be unloaded and then reloaded with everything needed for the next few races and will be going straight from one race to the next for the next month or so. This helps keep our companies costs down and gives us, the drivers, a break.

Zen....and the art of wheel washing.

For the truckies who also have the arduous task of looking after the tyres, comes the inevitable job of keeping the wheels clean. Does this help with the speed of the car? Does it stop the mechanics getting their hands even dirtier than they already are? Does it keep the inside of your very expensive tyre warming blankets clean? Or do they do it because they are bored and have no other jobs to do?
NO,NO,NO and NO !!!!!!!!!!
Appearance is everything at this level of motor sport. With television crews and photographers everywhere, a nice shiny car with dirty wheels is just not acceptable. So here is a short guide.

                                                   How do you get this wheel, clean?

The answer is plenty of paddock tap water, elbow grease and some strong cleaner. Some teams opt for the cleaning spray and a rag but this takes even more hard work and is used more as a quick fix. When multiple sets of wheels need attention, the first choice is water.

Water soluble cleaner

 

 

Spray on cleaner

For those teams lucky enough to have silver or black wheels, the cleaning process is a bit easier as these colours will hide the dirt better if the cleaning process is not 100%. For all other colours of wheels, white being a very popular choice, you must clean,clean,clean.
Now that you have decided on how to clean your wheels properly, where are you going to wash them?
The floor is the obvious choice. But squatting down or bending down is hard on the legs you are forced to constantly shift position as each wheel is washed and then moved out of the way before you move on the next one.

Old skool washing

Not good for the knees !

The second option is to use one of the wheels as a stand while you wash the others. This is a little bit easier but is still a flawed method as you may still have to squat or bend down. And when you get to that last wheel, you are back to washing on the floor again!

Better, but not perfect.

The third and most practical and sensible way is to make yourself a wash stand. No more hard work for your legs and back. You can even fit your wash stand with rollers to help spin the wheel when you wash it. Your water is kept in the wash stand so you do not have big puddles of water for the rest of the team or passers by to step through. And the guy washing the wheels can keep a good eye on the ladies walking around and even pose for the odd photograph for the fans.

The only down side to the wash stand approach is that it is one more piece of equipment that has to be packed up and put on the trucks but your body will love you for doing it!!!
So the next time you happen to be walking around a race paddock and see the truckies washing wheels the hard way, you can tell them about Zen, and the art of wheel washing.
Due to current European Health and Safety guidelines. I must warn you of the dangers of exposing your hands to constant wheel washing as I would not want your hands to look like this.........

La dolce vita

It was a very cold start to the day in Monza, but warmed up at 1100 hours. Some trucks had arrived yesterday and were already washed and parked outside their garages. The rest of the teams arrived yesterday evening and today.. The truck wash area in Monza is big, so we do not have teams waiting to use the water taps.This can be very annoying when you have so much other work to do. A peculiar feature here, is that the taps are not above ground. The teams have to lift up metal covers in the tarmac to be able to connect their hosepipes. Walking around the paddock today, I find out that 2 teams had punctures on the trip to Monza and both were on the trailer tyres. Luckily, no damage was done to the trailers. This means that the punctures happened at slow speed otherwise the tyre would have started falling apart and hitting the bodywork as the driver tries to slow down .The race trailers can sustain very expensive damage to the area around the wheels when a puncture happens. The cost to replace the tyre and repair and repaint the trailer bodywork can run into several thousand euros. One unlucky team suffered a blown turbo on the truck engine, but thanks to some very quick repairs, they were able to arrive here with the car and equipment. Teams do not want to be spending so much money just getting to the circuit, especially when they are on a tight budget. Also, having your truck parked up in a busy paddock on the race weekend, with loads of damage, is just not a good advertisement.

It was good to see new teams, new paintwork, new graphics and even some new trucks in the paddock. I have done some "rough" calculations and the total amount of kilometres travelled to Monza by all the race trucks, the tyre support and fuel supply vehicles amounts to approximately 27700 kilometres. And they will do the same amount getting back home.
And I have not included the hospitality trucks or the trucks who carry all of the advertising banners which are positioned around the circuit.
Trying to make race cars environmentally friendly and "green" seems to be a minor problem when you compare it the cost of getting them and everything else to the race track!!!!

 I have also updated the truck requirements for Spain and Germany in my previous post "Its the law", for those who are interested.

I have been talking to most of the truckies today, and with their support, I hope I can keep you informed and interested. Now that the season is getting underway, I will be doing some technical articles about race track facilities that affect them and also some detailed information on the various jobs they do. So bookmark my blog and keep reading it.

Tomorrow, there is a test day for those teams who need it and official testing starts on Saturday.Don't forget to tune in to Eurosport television to watch all the WTCC races live.ENJOY

paddock view

Paddock view

Messing around on the top of a truck

Zero to 14 degrees celsius, in 3 countries and 300km

Cold

Waking up at 0700 hours, our first job today is to see if the truck has got a parking ticket or if we have been clamped. Stopping in Hollendau Autobahn services last night, we noticed that there were signs in the truck parking area, saying we had a maximum waiting time of 2 hours. Admittedly, it has limited parking for only about 20 trucks, but we were left with no choice but to park up and take our obligatory 9 hour break.

Getting colder

THE EUROPEAN UNION RULES AND REGULATIONS STRIKE AGAIN !!!!! And you will keep those lawyers that I mentioned, in my last post, very happy if you do not comply. With no parking problems, its time for a quick breakfast and then head towards the Brenner Pass and push on through to Italy. With Monza only 300 kilometres away, we set off from a very cold Germany. Normally, Monza has been a race that has happened later in the year so we do not have to deal with these sort of temperatures.Unfortunately, as we head towards Austria, the sky is grey and the view is rubbish. We have to get our Austrian truck tax sorted before we go too far and we can fuel up the truck at the same time.

About as cold as it gets

Go Box

Brenner Pass Toll Booths

 We had some problems with our Go Box the last time we were in Austria and got a fine so we are keen to check that we have enough credit on the Go Box in case we have the same problem.The Go box is a small electronic device which attaches to the front windscreen of the truck. As we pass the overhead gantries which are positioned along the Autobahn, it should emit a beep. This sound means that the system has registered you passing a set point on the road and a percentage of your credit is deducted for the distance that you have travelled. These overhead gantries are sometimes fitted with cameras so that the registration plate of the truck can be taken. BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU.......and it,s more food for those lawyers should you wish to argue. My co-driver starts worrying when the Go Box beeps 4 times as we enter the toll section of the Brenner Pass, as he has never heard it beep so many times before. The 4 beeps means that as we pass through the toll, the charge has not been taken from our Go Box. We are meant to stop and have it checked within 5 hours or 100kilometres, whichever is sooner. According to the instructions, we might have problems again!! Oh dear. It might be a faulty box that we have, so an exchange may be needed. We will put that on the " things to do list". Continuing on up through the snowy mountains, passing ski slopes that run parallel to the road. and the Brenner See which is frozen and covered in snow. The speed is governed not by the speed limit, but by the truck in front of us. For almost 200 kilometres, there is one sign after another saying no overtaking for trucks. It,s eco terrorism at its slowest. I would like to elaborate on this but I will save it for a future post in my blog.

After a long, slow climb upwards, we take a slow descent across the Austrian-Italy border, and are still governed by the no overtaking rule. It gives us ample time to take in the scenery and gradually watch the sun emerge and the outside temperature climb to a much more pleasant, 14 degrees Celsius. This area of the border has changed and moved, many times over the years and you can see from the signs over factories and buildings that they are struggling with their identity and language. Some signs are very Italian and others are Austrian. And the local population probably speak both languages fluently.

Skiing by the road

Sunshine and scenery on the Italian side of the Brenner

Arriving at Monza around 1700 hours, we take a route to the circuit that we know. Italy is renowned for its road signs that point somewhere but take you nowhere. The roadworks have been ongoing for years and we navigate by recognising semi demolished bridges and local landmarks. For such an internationally famous race track, it is remarkably easy to get lost.The roads around the circuit are not really suited for a 16 metre long race truck.Through the gateway to Monza park, and into the tunnel that goes underneath the circuit, we recognise some familiar faces of the WTCC organisers. Some very abusive but not unfriendly words are exchanged with a smile on every ones, faces and  it,s time to park up and go the hotel. A relatively, trouble free journey for us. I hope the readers of this blog are slowly starting to realise that we do not just get in the truck and drive.It bears no comparison to going abroad in your car with a sat nav to guide you on your way. The many different road laws that we have to deal with and knowledge of the route that we take are pivotal to ensuring that the trucks get to their destination safely and trouble free.

Sat on a boat and going nowhere fast

Mind that paintwork

We are finally on our way to the first race of the season at Monza, Italy.  We have travelled on this route, many, many times. An overnight boat from Hull to Rotterdam will be our home for the next 12 hours. The food on board, never seems to change. The fixtures and fittings are getting tired and worn out. The toilet system seems to block up with amazing regularity. And the standing joke is that you are never, ever told an arrival time. It is normally around 0830, give or take a bit hours but the announcement over the ships tannoy system always says "We will arrive on schedule" They never say the exact time. Maybe this is just part of a relaxed Dutch attitude.

Unlike the cross channel ferries, this is not a roll on, roll off. We have to go backwards on this one. Reversing the truck onto the boat takes some concentration as you are leaving the darkness of the port and entering the bowels of the ferry with its very bright lights. Not very easy on the eyes and it is certainly a tight squeeze, as you can see in the picture.

Due to some issues with the brakes on the trailer, we are forced to go via a truck centre in Dusseldorf  for an experienced view of whether or not we can carry on. With over 1100 kilometres to the track and a trip through the mountains, plus the return journey, we need to make safety our prime concern. Not just for us but for all the other people on the roads. An out of control truck does some major damage in an accident.You will certainly feel the full force of the law if you are found guilty of negligence if an accident occurs.


 In the UK, we are now required to take a CPC training course. For the older drivers, we have until 2014 to complete it. Newer drivers should have it all ready This should apply across all EU member states as well.

Certificate of Professional Competence in National And International Road Haulage

 

  To attain a CPC,  candidates must pass or have passed the core module 1. Freight National is achieved after additionally passing modules 2 and 4, or passing modules 1, 2 and 4 together. Freight International is achieved by holding passes in modules 1, 2 and 4 and additionally passing module 6; or, passing modules 1, 2, 4 and 6 together.

                               
                                                                 CONFUSED ?????


This is meant to ensure that all truck drivers are fully conversant with all road laws, tachographs and the amount of hours you can work, basic first aid and a duty of care when driving. This goes back to my point about our situation with the brakes. Ignore the early warning signs and suffer the consequences later. e.g. losing your licence, big fines and possibly a stint in jail.

View from my seat.

In this world of health and safety for everyone, I really think that we are trying to wrap everyone up in cotton wool for protection. Is this making a safer place for us all or are we just keeping the lawyers in business. I think that there might even be some basic human rights issues going on here. Once you pass a recognised driving test, we are then forced to undertake additional training. If you are not trained properly, then the insurance companies will not insure you and then we are back to the lawyers again. But every time we are faced with new rules and regulations, the cost of putting on a race for people to watch, goes up, and up and up !!!

I hope that I have not bored you with my ranting and raving. But its my blog and my thoughts. I think that everyone,s opinion of this will be different. I am sure that in the motor sport business, the teams do their utmost to ensure that their truck drivers are competent, capable and courteous. After all, we are representing the team we work for. And if we behave irresponsibly, the general public and other road users will certainly remember us in our very distinctive vehicles.