One Week Down!

Whew... One week of driving training down, two weeks to go! It's been a stressful week but we have learned SO much.

Out to dinner to celebrate our first week

Unfortunately, I woke up with a head cold on Monday morning, which made me miserable for the first few days of class. Monday we spent the first half of the day filling out paperwork and then began learning from the CDL manual. Tuesday morning was more learning from the manual and quizzes on what we had learned. Then by Tuesday afternoon, we headed to the DMV to take the written tests for our driving permits! With three tests to take (general knowledge, air brakes, and combination vehicles), and less than two days of learning the information, it was a stressful time. But praise God, hubby and I both passed the tests and obtained our CDL permits.

First time driving a semi, and first time backing up!

The next few days have been continued classroom learning on things that we need to know before hitting the road - log books, hours of service limits, parts of the trucks and trailers, trip planning, map reading, turning safely, and a lot more information!

However, the thing most intimidating to me is learning to shift in a ten-speed manual transmission. Or maybe I should say...learning to shift in any manual transmission! Yeah, I've never driven a manual before...which meant I had a hard time understanding the concepts of shifting. Thankfully my sweet husband took the time to explain it all to me and reassure me that I would be able to pick it all up. My instructors were also patient with me and took me out in a bobtail (tractor without a trailer) to do laps around the parking lot practicing shifting.

Hubby smiling from the cab

We also got to start practicing straight backing yesterday - which is exactly what it sounds like, going backward and forward in a straight line within the confines of a very narrow lane of cones. For the next two weeks we will practice straight backing, offset backing (backing in a S-shape), and parallel parking. We will also be practicing the pre-trip inspection that must be done every time before driving a truck, since this is also on the CDL test. And finally we will get out on the road and actually drive!

We still have a long way to go, but we've already received offers from five different trucking companies. We've pretty sure we've narrowed it down to the one we want to hire on with, but please keep us in prayer as this is a big decision. In the meantime, please continue to keep us in prayer as we continue learning to drive!