Livestock truckie Robert Findlay from Gippsland reflects on truck driving career

A hammock with chains either side of the makeshift bed and self-mounted hooks on the roof of the truck would hold the hammock, long before sleepers and beds were common in most long-haul trucks.

"But if you wanted a piss, it was a performance getting out of it, I tell ya," Mr Findlay said.

"You used to go to Melbourne for $100 a load, now it's $1000 but back then fuel was nothing."

The 77-year-old livestock carrier recently sold his last truck, closing his chapter on a lifetime behind the wheel and the first time since World War II the Findlays have not run a trucking business in South Gippsland.

"The old man had a place in the town and four or five trucks carting to Newmarket, but they were only little, single deckers and trays," he said.

"They used to cart all bloody week and in those days it was a long way to Melbourne in those trucks."

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Mr Findlay remembers his mother would be up at all hours of the night feeding the returned truck drivers at their Leongatha depot.

After a meal, they would reload and head back into Melbourne with another load of livestock.

Back in those days, "no one ever checked those bloody logbooks", so the industry was far less regulated and drivers had fewer rest breaks.

At the age of 18, Mr Findlay was given his truck licence in 1963 and straight away started working with his father, a returned WWII veteran.

It wasn't long before he bought trucks of his own, but remained working in his folk's business for some time.

"That caused a bit of trouble with the old man because I had better trucks than him, such as a double decker stock crate... he never had one of those," he said.

Those early days carting cattle across the state paved the way for a life-long business in transport, carting mainly cattle and the occasional load of sheep, along with spuds to the Sydney market.

In partnership with his wife of 59 years, Ruth, the pair forged a strong business built on being dependable.

"Being reliable and honest are the most important parts of the job," Mr Findlay said.

His original truck was a 1960s Leyland Beaver, but it was not long before he purchased more powerful and capable trucks, including the pride of his fleet, a 1973 International Transtar 4070, which was later involved in a collision near Wodonga.

"We had five trucks on interstate at one time and we were mainly carting spuds and some paper from Maryvale in the winter," he said.

Perhaps one of the pair's most memorable moments was winning division one Tattslotto in June 1992, giving them a cash injection of $612,085 in one night.

"Every bastard still thinks it's in a jar on the mantelpiece," Mr Findlay said.

"We ended up putting it towards another farm."

In the mid 1980s, Mr Findlay was the first livestock carrier in South Gippsland to introduce a B-double cattle stock crate figuration, hauled by a cab-over Kenworth.

"We'd cart all over the bloody state, but mainly we would cart calves out of Ballarat and Hamilton and Omeo and Benambra and also Cooma, NSW, and Bairnsdale," he said.

"Getting the bastards into places was the biggest problem because yards in those days were only designed to hold two pens of cattle for a tray truck.

"There were no other B-doubles at that time."

Besides the transport business, Mr and Mrs Findlay also ran a busy cool store at Leongatha South for the spuds which was also where the fleet was regularly serviced.

"We have four girls and the youngest one, well I had her driving the forklifts and all kinds of things from a young age but she left to go to Melbourne to be a hairdresser and hasn't looked back," Mr Findlay said.

Along the way, they also acquired several properties, but in the last 12 months, have sold two of their farms.

"We've still got 250-300 cattle down the paddock," he said.

The Findlays mainly buy in 500 kilogram Angus steers and grow them for 12 months.

"We've got a caravan out in the shed that hasn't come out in two years because I was so focused on getting around to the sales," Mr Findlay said.

"All I want to do is tow my caravan with the car so I don't need my truck licence now.

"I haven't worked that hard lately but I'm still going here or going there so getting out of that rhythm is quite hard."