It is a long journey indeed from British Columbia on Canada’s west coast to the town of Boonah in southern Queensland, even more so given a detour via the rugged forest country of New Zealand’s North Island.
But it is a trek that a truck, lovingly referred to as ‘Mr P’, has reliably undertaken over the last 48 years and is now back in the hands of its original family owners.
Established in Canada in 1947, Pacific Trucks was a manufacturer of heavy-duty trucks which were sent all over the world from their Vancouver plant until the company’s demise in 1991.
In 1976, a batch of Pacific P610 models were consigned to New Zealand, with the final truck in the shipment purchased by log haulage contractors Dave and Kay Towersey of Rotorua.
After a long working life the Pacific, along with its owners, crossed the Tasman to Australia where the truck began its second life at a much slower pace.
With Pacific trucks somewhat of a rarity on Australian roads, in 2021 the P610 came back into the possession of Dave’s daughter, Ali Talbot, who shared the history of ‘Mr P’ at the recent Heritage Truck Show at Rocklea.
“It was built in late 1976; there were only 15 of this model built, with the whole lot sent out to New Zealand from British Columbia,” explained Ali.
“My dad and mum took delivery of it out of International Harvester Rotorua in March 1977 before being sent to Mills-Tui for the bolsters and all the logging gear to be fitted.”
With the D.B. Towersey operation starting out with a petrol-powered White, and then AECs, the Pacific, with its 350hp Cummins and low-ratio diffs was well suited to log haulage around the wider Rotorua region.
“Dad had a small fleet of trucks, running ERFs and the Pacific, and spent around 20 years logging from the Kaingaroa Forest to Waipa – when he finished the log haulage he put a bin on it and a quad trailer hauling bark, sawdust and wood shavings,” Ali said with a smile.
“He never had any trouble with it. He wanted nine sons but got two daughters and always said he would get rid of us before he got rid of the truck.”
With no plans to ever offload the truck, Dave had some ideas in mind for the faithful P610 when the time came to wind back the workload.
“When he had the chip bin on the truck he started to visualise a motorhome, so the chip bin came off and he started building it with a group of friends on the family farm Kaharoa just north of Rotorua,” Ali said.
“It’s about 12 metres long – Dad was 6’ 8”, he told Mum he didn’t want to be like a sardine in a can in it so it’s pretty big.”
With the Pacific taking on its new duty around 2001, Dave and Kay covered off New Zealand’s South Island before loading it on a boat and heading over ‘the ditch’ to Australia, spending the next four years doing a lap around the continent.
“They absolutely loved it, all the places they went it never let them down – being set up for logging it’s no racehorse but Dad always said they were going to take their time.
“They settled back in Yatala here in Queensland as Dad and Mum had seen everything in Australia and Dad had got to the stage where it was getting hard to keep travelling.”
Reluctantly Dave put the Pacific up for sale, only on the condition that it was going to the right mechanically minded person, with the truck being bought on a handshake deal by Jeremy Fraser.
Knowing the truck was in good hands, Ali always had an eye on the future.
“Jeremy had always wanted the truck; he bought it about 2010. Dad passed away in 2014 and I said to Jeremy ‘I would love it to come back into the family if you ever decide to sell it’, so we kept in touch. In 2021 one of our daughters’ friends saw it out at Plainlands and that it was coming up for sale, so I contacted Jeremy. He was incredible. He had looked after it so well, but he didn’t get to do his ‘lap around’ with it unfortunately.”
With a purchase made and Ali in New Zealand, her husband Steve and daughter Chrissy had the honours of bringing the Pacific back to Boonah.
The truck had not been started in five years so with fresh oil, filters and a couple of new batteries the faithful Cummins soon roared back into life, and given the truck had not done a lot of miles in the preceding years it was still in sound shape.
“We had the truck out at Boonah and my mum saw it and burst into tears, was like it had been in a time capsule – we went through the truck and still had her linen in it, she was absolutely rapt the truck is back in the family.”
Over the last couple of years Ali and Steve have given the Pacific a freshen-up, having stripped out and repainted the cab along with replacing a few hoses and replacing some wiring and lights.
Given the age of the motorhome some of the upholstery and fittings are also being updated but overall, there is every indication the P610 would readily undertake its next ‘lap of the map’.
“It’s been really great to have it back; we have taken it on a couple of runs to see if there’s any issues.
“We are both still working so we just tinker away at it, but everything in it is original. Dad was pedantic about going in the outback and having it break down so be built it to be bulletproof,” said Ali.
While Ali’s family and the Pacific still have some miles to make in Australia, she has some ideas about when the time will come for the P610 to finally be parked.
“We will get out there and do the same thing! Both our girls have got their truck licences so they may want to do the same after we have finished with it.
“Ideally I would like to put it on the boat back to New Zealand as that’s where its working life was, it hasn’t got any work history here in Australia – there was only 15 of this model ever built so it might end up in a transport museum back home.”
Until then, keep an eye out for ‘Mr P’ on roads over this side of the Tasman, as the next chapter of its near five-decade, three continent journey continues to be written.