Mainly an enjoyable experience
This was a very enjoyable experience, in my sixty two years of driving many different vehicles including lorries, this was very different. The instructor couldn't have been more helpful and tolerant as I struggled to come to terms with the first handful of its eighteen gears. I highly recommend this experience and personally hope to do it again.
There was just one issue however, but please don't let it put you off. We arrived very early in order not to be late and to go for a relaxing breakfast first. The truck arrived on site around the same time and the driver suggested we return in about forty five minutes as I thinks he can fit me in early.
The Missus and I went and found somewhere for breakfast, which we bolted down in order to get back in forty five minutes. I parked my van about twelve feet from the tent which they were struggling to erect in the very high winds, my offer to help was declined. For the next fifty minutes we sat, bored silly in our van waiting to be called out.
The wife then saw someone arrive and go straight into the tent, so I did likewise. The new arrival looked at me and said “Look someone else has arrived”. Talk about rub salt into the wound, I pointed out that I hadn't just arrived but been there for nearly an hour. It turned out that these people were due before me and it had been decided that due to the problems setting up they would not be able to fit me in early after all, so I would be after them as scheduled.
As I have just said, everyone was very nice and pleasant, but it was so annoying that having suggested we return in forty five minutes and having rushed our breakfasts to return and plant our van right outside their tent, all they had to do was poke a head out of the tent to tell us of their revised plan so we could pop off for a couple of hours to maybe visit the nearby aquarium, instead of sitting like lemons in our van, bang outside the tent, expecting all the time to be called in early.