Sometimes you see something and it takes you right back in time. That happened to me on Wednesday night and it transported me back more than 40 years. The evenings are getting a little lighter and the journey to and from work becomes seasonally slightly less mundane. After all I estimate I have now travelled between the same two points at least 10,000 times. But on Wednesday evening, just as the light was fading and I was swinging through that little dip and series of curves near Marton on the A34, which is a bit like the famous Eau Rouge section in the Belgian Grand Prix, I suddenly saw something to my side that made me gasp in delight.
Now it wasn’t the sort of thing that will make most people get excited about, and yes, my strangeness will now be exhibited in full once more, but sometimes something brings back such strong memories and emotions, you can’t help yourself. Or perhaps you can, and it is just me that struggles in this respect. What did I see? Nothing less than the angular outline of a Zetor Crystal 12011 tractor!!!!!
But the light was fading fast so I thought I would carry on and leave for work a little earlier the next morning and take a closer look at it then. Imagine my horror when I came round the bend the next morning to find the Zetor gone, not least because I had foregone some much needed sleep, but also because I really wanted to see the hare and tortoise again (don’t worry, all will be revealed later). I must admit I felt a real loss which was only lifted when I passed the same agricultural equipment supplier’s premises on my way home and with great relief spotted that angular cab top safely tucked up in the back of the yard.
Finally this morning, on a bright and frosty morning I got there and stood before the great machine in awe. There was no one about, so I tried the cab door, and when it opened, climbed inside in glee. Settling into the rather dirty, hydraulically sprung seat, I took in the cab layout I hadn't seen for so long, and then looked down at the dials and controls below the large steering wheel. I had to see if it was exactly the same as I remembered from all that time I spent driving a Zetor Crystal 12011 as a teenager.
Growing up on a farm is a unique experience. You probably get your first chance to steer a car when you are somewhere around 5-7 years old. Steering a tractor comes a bit later but by about 13 you might be entrusted to move a tractor forwards a short distance in a wide field while your dad throws some hay or turnips off the trailer to the sheep behind you. And by the age of 15 you are a competent, if perhaps fairly wild, farm worker with your own MOT failure car you could use up and down the farm road as fast as you liked.
At that time, and in that part of the country, the Ford Major tractor was king. The Nuffields and David Browns never seemed as reliable or as useful. Although the acquisition of a green and yellow, brand new John Deere machine from America surpassed all in terms of unreliability. But the John Deere did have a nice seat and a Duncan cab which at least afforded some shelter on three sides from the worst of the Caithness weather, compared to the older tractors that were normally totally open, or at best had a flimsy wooden cab. A passenger had to cling on to the rear linkage and try to get their head in under the back of the cab. That was not easy when the tractor was bouncing from rut to pothole at full speed on a farm track. Only those who have done it will know what good training it would be for a stunt person.
So when the Zetor Crystal 12011 came on the market in 1974 it was a major revelation to us stuck at the end of the world in Caithness. It was big and angular, with a huge glass enclosed safety cab. And it was powerful compared to anything we had previously had...120 Horse Power. It had a sweet sounding six cylinder 6.8 litre engine, so different to the clattering and popping old Ford Majors. It was tall, the whole thing seemingly made out of steel girders with no attempt to keep weight down. There was a jump seat behind the driver's and on a cold day three of us sons could fit in there while our dad drove us to school through the snow. The roof of the cab could be opened up on hot days and the back window opened too! It even had a cigarette lighter. These were all revelations compared to the older farm equipment we had.
But sitting to drive it was the best bit: the climb up to the cab in your mud caked welly boots,: settling into that hydraulically cushioned seat, hands on that big steel steering wheel, booted feet planted on the big pedals to either side, and looking out over that long red bonnet. And somewhere down there, the hare and the tortoise. Bearing in mind that this was back in the old Soviet days, their machinery was tank like and pretty crude. The dash console seemed to be a slab of 1 inch thick cast iron, which was roughly engraved with symbols, such as "STOP", an arrow and a cog symbol for the Power Take Off (for non-farming types that means for the implement drive shaft on the back and is not some James Bondish rocket boosted hedge and gate hopping vertical take-off system which would save time getting from field to field). But the symbols that endeared the Zetor to us most were the Hare and Tortoise, the symbols for ......guess? Fast and Slow!
When several machines were out working on the farm I tried to make sure I grabbed the big Zetor and leave the other workers with the older machines. As a 15 year old I felt immense power sat in the driving seat and everywhere I went was at full speed (probably barely 20mph) with the handle cranked round to "Hare" . The machine seemed invincible! Of course hour after hour, day after day, might be spent going up and down a field towing a hay baler at 3mph but on the road (once I was 17) the separate, and very stiff, throttle lever was pulled round as far as it would go. This got me into trouble twice.
The first time was in summer when I was thundering down our single track farm road. It is pretty straight but there is a kink near the Tups Quarry and a slight brow. I had spotted the red car approaching with a cloud of dust about 400 yards away but as we closed to 100 yards the car pulled into the gateway of the Tups Quarry (I wondered where my quarry fetish started) on the brow. And I thought, "I'm in the big tractor, I can pull onto the verge and let him come on down the road". And so I pulled onto the grass and carried without letting up. But frustratingly the seed and fertiliser salesman stayed where he was and instead of us having passed each other already I found myself crossing the gateway entrance to another field, tractor dropping into the hollow only to hit the upside of the entrance twenty feet further on. This compressed the suspension in my seat so that as the tractor lifted over the lip of the gateway entrance I was fired up against the roof of the cab. My head smashed off the inside of the very rigid safety cab frame so that I collapsed on the floor of the cab alongside the brake pedals, my face pressed up against the glass panel facing directly out at the salesman below me in his stationary car. With the one lever pulled round to "Hare" and the separate stiff throttle pulled round for full speed, the tractor carried on down the verge of the road, me struggling to get upright again and gain control of the machine, whilst a vivid memory of the salesman's face with wide eyes and a big 'O' for a mouth was etched in my mind forever. On that occasion I was embarrassed. The next time I was scared.
The second time was in autumn and I had just taken a load of lambs to the market. Rather than eat a super warmed Scotch Pie from the Thurso Auction Mart shop with sheep's muck stained fingers I decided to go down town to get some fish and chips which I could enjoy with sheep's muck stained fingers. Thurso High School was out for lunch and there were streams of pupils (they call them students now) heading down past the auction mart and railway station, down the long street to the town centre. Now in that community nothing impresses the girls more than a young hard working lad in a big tractor and so I steamed off past the pupils, some being girls that I knew who had been a year or two younger than me. With one lever round in "Hare" and the other sticky throttle lever jammed wide open all went well until a Police car pulled out of a side street ahead of me, and then slowed down behind two cars turning in front of the Royal Bank of Scotland. Needing to slow down I closed the separate stick throttle but to my horror nothing happened. And then I noticed that the hand lever throttle and the foot throttle are connected by a push rod system. But having pulled the hand throttle fully open, with some wear over the years, the bar that the foot throttle presses if you put your foot on it, had come over the top, and was holding it down to the cab floor in the fully open throttle position! (Did you follow that? I don't think I can explain it more easily without doing some drawings) In a split second I was in a muck sweat realising I had to do something very fast to stop four tonnes of tractor steaming over the police car and two cars in front and in through the front of the Royal Bank of Scotland. Pressing the clutch down fully with my left boot I tried to bridge the two separate brake pedals you have in a tractor (one for each big rear wheel) and apply equal pressure to both to prevent the Zetor weaving all over the road. There were a few scary seconds as I tried to pull the tractor up and I did manage it, just, but I swore never to be caught out by the foot throttle pedal being locked to the floor of the cab again.
But I do have fond memories of the Zetor Crystal tractor. It was an excellent, robust machine, and though worked very hard, I could see that apart from some dirt, it was just the same machine as I knew back in the mid-1970s. I don't think I ever used the Tortoise speed settings. I always went everywhere in Hare. I still do. It might seem very strange to 'normal' people, but seeing those Hare and Tortoise symbols on the dash panel once again this morning really made my day!
If you've made it all the way down here, I'm sorry it wasn't more thrilling or entertaining but I needed to get some memories out before I lose my mind. Or do you think I have already?
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