Phil's horse transport odyssey.

Horse Transport by Phil Wilson (part1)
Well where do you start, I have been doing horse transport and then International horse transport working for Veronica Shilton, at Yew Tree farm for about three years now. I go not so much as a lorry driver, but as an experienced horseman, customer care manager, drug administrator, mechanic and interpreter when we are in France. Our main customer base was UK transport, but we now specialise in moving animals whose owners are emigrating. Last year 53,000 people left the UK to settle in France, mainly in Normandy where land and property is cheap.
The French attitude to land sales is vastly different from here, they still have a ‘peasant’ outlook and everything is done through the Mayor. We have transported race horses worth half a million pounds, donkeys and dogs, carriages and Cobs. A good number of our customers for instance do not speak French, but they get satellite t.v. so they can watch ‘Corrie’ ! How they expect to fit in, by creating ‘Little England’ in a minor village I do not know. Well after numerous trips we have become expert at DEFRA and veterinary paperwork, and the leather hat effect. Leather hat effect I hear you say, well let’s look at a typical trip we did in early July this year.
Get to the farm for 6.30 am and check the oil, water etc. Tipp-Ex the tacograph disc and change any true facts! (Actually we are fully licensed with an International ‘Operators Licence’ CPC and DEFRA and veterinary approval to move livestock except cattle.) The MAN has air suspension, has just had £3500 of air conditioning fitted to the rear box, and CCTV, so we can see what the animals are doing. (There are operators working within the UK still without an ‘O’ licence, be warned you use them your horse and you yourself are un-insured in that case.) First call is Gloucester, pick up a thirty year old hack form a livery yard and deliver him to Taunton. At this point we find the CCTV has packed up, the men who fitted the air con have either pinched or put a screw through the fibre optic cable to the monitor. So although we can lower the back of the truck (let the air suspension down) and give him an easy climb up the ramp we cannot see what he travels like.)

Next part is a trundle along narrow winding lanes with mirrors pulled in and an inch or two either side until we get to a decent main road, maximum speed 20 MPH. Not ideal as we are on the tachograph and have to make the night ferry from Portsmouth tonight, to Caen in France. Finally ‘Methuselah’ is delivered to his new home, wringing with sweat. ‘I am amazed he loaded at all, he is a bloody awful traveller, jumps around and slips on his own sweat, you have done well! It would be nice to be told the truth from the word go, you can then plan accordingly. (A deep bed of shavings for instance, and travel him loose.) Time is imperative and always a precious commodity, after a reasonable trip we are back to winding lanes, north to Weston Supermud the owner has met us in her 4 X 4 to guide the way. (A typical scenario)
Unfortunately they all seem to have been on the Colin Mc Crea RAC Rally driving course and blast around blind bends on single track roads at Warp 6. Our aim is to deliver an animal, cool, calm and safe after a journey by road or sea that can last two days or more. I will never forget trying to keep sight of a madman in an Isuzu Turbo ‘Kamikaze 6B’ (Grey Import form the last war) as we crossed the Black Mountains in Ireland. One a.m. in the morning, pot holes and ruts, pixies and marsh grass a foot high in the middle of the road, no moon and just the glow of his single after burner to spot now and then. Sometimes you are lucky and both tail lights work!
The MAN is 7.5 tonnes (an 8.163 model) and is ideal for this kind of work; Veronica and I have spent many hours chewing the fat over going to a larger truck. It’s a trade off, we can get into places so tight you would not get a ten or twelve tonne truck in. However the payload is only 1.9 tonnes, as it is a solid chassis cab, un strained at 70MPH loaded, and will cruise all day at 60 on the A20 across France. If we go larger then we cannot get to the obscure Welsh, run down B&B the hopeful and optimistic Brits have bought, off an ageing couple glad to be rid of“Pontypissingdownallthebloodytimeweneedtogogetout”
Well where does the hat come in you ask, customs and the ferry operators is the answer! I bought my South African all leather ‘Rogue’ hat to keep my bald British bonce from burning in the heat of Lowestoft or Newmarket. (In Newmarket when we collect Race Horses to transport to Glasgow or Edinburgh, all five feet nine of me becomes a giant, compared to the retired jockeys who run the yards) At all the ports across the channel it sticks out, no Turkish, Spanish, French or Algerian drivers wear a hat. The appearance of the hat at Brittany Ferries at midnight brings a cheery Bonsoir Phileeeepe from the guy on the ticket desk. I hand over a DEFRA file, with route map, vet certificates, horse passports for two Gecko’s and a Llama. Oh dear you are 340 kilo’s over weight and 1.23 metres too long, ‘ce la vie’ the ticket is stamped, the file handed back un-touched and off we go.
Apart from the countryside, and amazing peasant farming produce you can buy if you know where to look, the height of the trip for me is the ‘Drivers Club’ aboard ship. All manner of exotic food awaits, Cold Meats and Salami, Giant Prawns, Crevettes, Roasted Peppers in Olive Oil, Salmon fillets Swedish Style, Artichoke Hearts heaped high, and this is just the starters, with no limit! Usually Shell or so it seems lash a tanker of blended Cote’s Du Rhone to the side of the ship, free with your meal. It is wonderful stuff, and the supply is endless. Just as well I have seven hours to sleep it off! One trip was memorable because the barman won £1500 on the fruit machine, and proceeded to drink the lot, he gave free drinks to the on board magician, who got drunk along with the resident DJ. This lead to a fight of epic proportions and security turned up, armed and with the Purser (Ships Accountant) as back up, the truckers refused to let the bar close, and I understand the barman has been on the boat for the last six months trying to pay off his bar bill, and damages invoice. Breakfast is a free for all, with typical croissant, coffee and jam, no sign of a Full English, unless you are in the know. Slip Jean Claude a fiver and vois la, Bacon, Eggs the lot. Sterling buys more than Euro’s on the boat, don’t change your money, pay for the beer in GBP at the bar and save 30% on what the Europeans pay.

The Wacky World of Horse (and other animal) Transport. (part2)

When you travel across the channel, generally it’s a seven hour crossing, what most people don’t realise is that once the cargo deck doors are shut, that is it. No access to the animals until you land. Since 911 security is very tight, and the lorries are so tightly packed you can only get out of one door of the cab. On one trip we took three donkeys, seven Neapolitan Mastiffs and a doddery cat running on force of habit, rather than the will to live! The parting shot from the owner (After we physically lifted the donkey stallion into the truck, because he had a thing about Dutch built lorries.) was the cat has a heart condition and needs a pill every six hours !!!

So I had to persuade security to let me onto the cargo deck at 3.00 am, I was allowed
four minutes to give a snarling ginger tom a pill it did not want. (I never knew how far you could get an index finger into a cats throat, and get a feline tattoo at the same time till then.) Now bare in mind I had to persuade the P&O version of the SAS in French I was not a terrorist, and had to climb into the truck in my underpants!!! They had to be sure I was not armed, a member of the ‘Shit Ant Militia’ or ‘Been Overladen’

When you disembark no one gives a damn, and we stop just outside the docks to check and water our cargo. On goes the radio and we spend the next four hundred miles changing radio stations, drinking Lucozade by the gallon (Red Bull actually makes me sleep?) until we reach Board Ducks . I think I should point out my friend Veronica cannot, and will not attempt to speak French. I ask which is the next town to head for and I get, Less Manns. Now is this a Yorkshire town lacking beer or what?
Cog Knack in the south was particularly elusive until we smelled it, I recall.

On one occasion we delivered two Arab Stallions and a Mare to the far south of France, close to the Spanish border. We arrived at midnight, only to find the owners completely pissed! They were so excited at the arrival of the horses, they started celebrating when we left Cumbria, four days before. Pitch black down a narrow lane, a village straight out of a Stella Artois advert, and Mr Owner can’t stand! ‘Doo yow know anything aboooout frog electric fencing’ I was asked. Now apart from little moonlight, three bemused horses, a transformer and jumble of wires, being colour blind does not help.

If I wire this up wrong, it could blow the transformer I said, ‘Not to worry mate, ‘Rene’ will be waiting at the café for us with a bottle of wine, we will show those Gerry bastards what the restistaaaaaance can do’ Oh shit I thought, this ones lost the plot. Somehow I sorted it out, though straight mains did seem a little excessive, for a paddock. We retired to a local B&B at 2.00 am, to be presented with fine food, local wine, and freshly baked bread from the Boulangerie. The proprietor had told the baker we would be arriving late, and he had baked a local bread with five grains in it, just for us. Somehow I don’t think that would happen in Telford.

Generally we do not get a ‘back load’ and hammer back for the ferry at 70 to 80 MPH if we are in the MAN. It does not have a speed limiter and fly’s with the tachograph against the stop. Our next job is Telford, to Dunfermline, on to Prestwick to Portsmouth and down to Angouleme in the foot hills of the Pyrenees. This will be done in the 17 tonner, an Iveco with air suspension, air con for the horses and cctv etc. The down side is we have 280 BHP, an 8 speed splitter gearbox and it accelerates like hell, then you hit 56 MPH and the speed limiter cuts in. Cruising at 56 is boring; Veronica provides the entertainment by trying to get Coronation Street on her portable satellite telly. (This constantly falls off the dash, as we pass foreign truckers, in Germany, Holland, Denmark etc, her feet against the windscreen, and no steering wheel!)

It’s long hard work, but you cannot beat delivering someone’s pet, or a race horse or a Llama, as cool as a cucumber and see the joy on the owners face. For the record this is a professional business, you have to comply with VOSA, DEFRA and EU regulations, have a ‘Goods Vehicle Operators Licence’ and be able to cope with a thousand miles of red tape. Once you cross the channel, we could use a clapped Bedford TK, and a Labrador to guide the way, talk about dual standards!
 

Yew Tree Horse Transport. + 44 (0)1952 460607

Top Picture. Phil steering a slightly slower mode of transport a 1913 Fowler BB November 2005.