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November 2011
North Island Madness - The Global Boys on Tour
It was a trip we'd been planning for months, three truck mad kiwis Aaron Ferguson, Nigel Turner and myself joined by two truck mad aussies from Adelaide Nick Borzo and David Kruisdyk. Kicking off on October 7th I flew up to Wellington and met up with Aaron who had been snapping away down at Wellington Port until I arrived. We then headed up the West Coast to Paraparaumu to meet up with my mate Gavin Shaw and shoot the new Allan Shaw Western Star tractor unit that had gone on the road a week prior. After a entertaining detour we eventually found the motorway and headed to Feilding to do the last shots of Matt Sherlocks "Helenbak Haulage" 575hp Mack CL before it was picked up by new owner Brett Marsh. Matt has been a friend for a long time and it was a priviledge to be able to take the photos for him. After a night in Wanganui we hit the road early and headed for New Plymouth where I had organised a shoot with Aaron Reid and a few of his mates. The weather held off for us and we got some very cool shots of the ex Trevor Harcourt Western Star that Aaron now drives in Hookers colours, two of J.D.Hickman's sharpest Kenworths, the imposing T904 of Chemcouriers owned by Reuben and a G.J.Sole Kenworth.
Hitting the road once again we then made our way to Rotorua via PioPio where a couple of the boys at P.T.L had agreed to kindly park up the 730 Scania stock truck and the new Freightliner Argosy that was only a week old. The 620 Scania stock truck also came along which made a great double shot!
Happy as a pig in s%#t we eventually got to Rotorua and crashed at Nigels place.
The three of us left Rotorua and headed to Auckland to pick up Nick who was flying in that night...plenty of time to squeeze in a few more photos before the first of the aussies arrived so we went to Matamata and were kindly shown around Jswaps by David Swap. I had organised some shoots in Auckland at Northchill with driver Paul Crooks and at Balle Bros with Ben Earle but because of a stomach bug I didn't participate much at all. Nick flew in on time and we headed to Whangarei for the night and to catch the second half of the All Blacks Quarter Final match. Monday we spent all day from 7.30am til 6pm on Marsden Point road taing around 300 shots including the new Aztec Kenworth K108e logger and a large amount of Smith and Davies gear. We decided to head back to Rotorua that night and then due to the weather changed our plans and headed to Tar Hill near Tokoroa on Tuesday catching the new Western Star logger for Reg Smith and Greens K108e logger among another 200 shots to add to the collection. After a day at Tar Hill we headed to the legendary Stag Park Diner for a good feed and managed to snap a couple of shots of trucks that were coming and going.
That night Dave arrived from Aussie just in time to join us for our trip to The Webb and the Off Highway road which we were able to get permits for from Charlie Meihana whom we met the night before, what a top bloke! The weather didnt really play ball but we still managed to get some shots of the big stems units and Off Highway gear. Afterwards Darryn Caulfield opened his Uncle Barry's museum for us to see his amazing collection of restored trucks.
Thursday started out great on the Kamais ranges shooting 200 trucks by lunch time but on our way to TePuke Nigels girlfriend Sharon was involved in a bad accident right infront of us but luckily she was ok and Nigel stayed behind at Tauranga hospital to make sure she was.
We put all of our gear into Aaron's car and headed to Rotorua to grab the rest of our stuff before heading to Napier for three nights. Stag Park was once again a stop in point on the way and then over the Napier/ Taupo's to our destination.
Friday went well and we finally had some good weather for a change which was perfect because Napier has some of the sharpest gear on the roads in the country. Nick and I headed out to the Napier/Taupo road while Aaron and Dave stayed in by the port and weighbridge. During the day we swapped around and went to different spots catching up with a few of the Panpac loggers we wanted. The next day was the Napier/Hastings Truck Show and again the sun was shining brightly for the approx 130 trucks that entered. I arranged a few trucks to park up afterwards for photos, trucks like Chapmans Peterbilt, the three K108e's contracted to Panpac, EMT's T904, Portland Express and a few more. That night we had a few beers down at the local and crawled back to the house around 3.30am...needless to say it was a great night!
Sunday was Aarons last day so we headed back to Taupo where a good friend of mine Raymond Bradshaw had organised 20 cabover Kenworths for a photoshoot! I was given the task to line them up which was alot of fun but took a while. Nigel and Sharon joined us at the shoot and after lunch at Stag Park Aaron headed home to Wanganui while we headed to Tokoroa for a look around and a few photos.
Monday lunchtime Nigel, Dave and Nick dropped me at the airport and I headed back to Christchurch after a fantastic trip while the other boys carried on for another week. Both Dave and Nick returned to Aussie with a heap of photos and all of us will do it again one day..maybe in the South Island or Aussie next time.
Global Tour
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