A Man, A Dream and a very big Kenworth.

A Man, A Dream and a very big Kenworth.

Words and Photography by Rod Simmonds.

There’s a certain romance to livestock transport. Not the rose-petal sort—they don’t make scented candles called Essence of Effluent Tank—but a gritty, uniquely rural professionalism born in the dust, dung and dawn chill of stockyards across Australia and New Zealand. It’s a world filled with people who possess equal parts skill, patience, and stubbornness. And every now and then, one of those people gets to live out a dream so big, so unmistakably trucking, that you can practically hear the theme music swell.

For Clifton Smith of Hawke’s Bay, that moment has arrived.
And it sounds like a 600-plus-horsepower Kenworth K220 Aerodyne clearing its throat.

From Wash Boy to Wheelman

If this were a fairy tale, the opening lines would read something like “Once upon a time, in the mystical land of Te Kuiti, a young lad held aloft a sponge and declared: One day, I shall drive the big shiny one.”

But this is livestock transport, not Disney, so imagine instead teenage Clifton, sleeves rolled up at Lime Haulage Ltd, scrubbing down a fleet of working trucks and quietly, earnestly absorbing everything around him.

Then imagine him climbing the metaphoric ladder the proper way: yard work, early starts, late finishes, Volvo after Volvo, first at Waitoa Haulage, then Graeme Wright Transport, before a stint with Nationwide Livestock in International Eagles and Scanias that saw him traverse pretty much every mile of rural New Zealand that has a cattle grid (plus a few that probably shouldn’t).

There was a brief diversion into bulk work as well, just long enough for him to confirm what he’d suspected all along: his heart belonged to livestock. Dusty yards. Early mornings. The responsibility. The camaraderie. The chaos. The whole messy, marvellous business.

Enter the Dream: A Kenworth K-Series Aerodyne

By 2020, Clifton had set himself up as a dedicated contractor to Farmers Transport Ltd in a new Volvo FH700. Six seasons, nearly 800,000 kilometres and a lot of very well-travelled boots later, the time came for an upgrade.

But instead of simply ordering another Swede, Clifton decided to follow the gravitational pull of a dream that had been orbiting his head since those wash-bay days: the iconic K-Series Aerodyne. The poster-truck. The hero-rig. The one that makes grown men go quiet for a moment before muttering something about “bucket lists.”

And so, with the support of wife Melanie—C&M Livestock being very much a team operation—the dream took physical, chrome-laden form: a brand-new, Australian-built Kenworth K220 Aerodyne. A magnificent piece of machinery that looks as though it should come with its own orchestral score and slow-motion cinematography.

A Trailer Worthy of the Occasion

Of course, a K220 without a proper stock trailer behind it is like a tuxedo without trousers—impressive from the waist up but not fully dressed.

So, the existing five-axle trailer underwent a proper spruce-up: refurbished Delta crates, fresh paint, and a raft of neat touches from the team at Jacksons; deck work, concealed lighting, effluent tanks, toolboxes, the whole works.

The result? A combination that doesn’t just look sharp—it works beautifully. The crates run quiet, the trailer tracks true, and the K220 glides along with a serenity previously unknown to livestock operators who remember the era of screaming Detroit’s in day-cab K144s.

Not that Clifton minds the nostalgia. But refinement, it must be said, has its place.

Stripes, Style and Local Flair

Good trucks deserve good colours. Clifton left the livery to local specialists HRPP Ltd, who turned out a modern interpretation of the traditional Farmers Transport scheme that’s nothing short of sublime. The stripes accentuate the K220’s new cab lines in a way that will appease both the purists and the Instagram crowd—a rare diplomatic triumph.

Set against the sun-bleached browns of Hawke’s Bay, the finished rig looks like a moving postcard: bold, confident, and unmistakably Kenworth.

A Company with History, A Driver with Purpose

Farmers Transport Ltd traces its roots back to the 1930s and remains a cornerstone of rural freight in the region. The modern, scaled-back Hawkes Bay Farmers Transport Ltd runs out of Hastings and Waipawa, focusing on the core rural work that defined the original operation decades ago.

It’s fitting, then, that Clifton’s new K220 echoes that heritage. Farmers Transport’s old day-cab K144s and K125s—often with Sutton three-deck crates and Detroit 8V92s making the sort of noise you could feel in your fillings—were icons of their time. And now, 40 years later, Clifton rolls out in a successor that retains the spirit but brings a quiet, luxurious maturity.

Back in the Big Cab. Back in the Road Ranger

Clifton is now settling into the Aerodyne life—plenty of room, plenty of comfort, and, for a bit of nostalgia, a Roadranger gearbox to master once more. Out on the road, surrounded by some of the best rural scenery on earth, it’s clear the dream wasn’t just about owning a Kenworth.

It was about earning one. About arriving at a point in life where the miles, the mud, the early starts, and the late finishes finally crystallise into something unmistakably special.

And as Clifton pilots his gleaming K220 across the backroads of New Zealand, one thing is abundantly clear.

Yes—Dreams do come true.

Especially when they’re painted, chromed and built in Bayswater.