I walked nervously across the yard of Garn Transport. Only electricity pylons and industrial estates interrupted the views across the Lincolnshire countryside. Ahead, Spalding Power Station spread  fingers of mist into the grey sky. In its shadow stood the Garn trucks.

Behind a particularly shiny red and grey one, I would find Jayne Pell. On the back of her cab I could make out some writing: “I have PMS and a handgun, any questions?” I was scared. I’d asked a couple of her colleagues what to expect. “Oh,” they replied, “she’s one of a kind, our Jayne,” and laughed knowingly without elaborating.

I approached with one of Jayne’s bosses. Despite having worked nights all week he told me she had come in early to wash the truck. “Jayne,” he shouted as we walked closer. “There’s someone to see you.” Jayne stood laughing with the photographer. She greeted me with a smile.

Sixteen years ago Jayne Pell worked in a transport office and volunteered to take her HGV test so she could help take the trucks to be serviced. On the week she qualified she was also made redundant and decided to do ‘a bit of driving’. “But I never stopped,” she says.

At 38, she is one of a handful of women who drive full-time and her fondness for commercial vehicles has turned into something of an obsession. “I wash it every week,” she says proudly. “I go underneath with a sponge and everything, but I only shine it up when I go to a show.”

Her love affair with Scanias was consummated recently when Garn Transport bought her a brand new R 500 LA6x2/4MNA twin-steer tractor unit, complete with a luxuriously appointed Topline cab. To date, she has spent almost £900 of her own money on extras including wheel trims, a hand-airbrushed registration plate and side-bars.

The owners bought the vehicle with Jayne in mind, knowing she would take great care of it. “That truck spends more time being polished than going up the road!” quipped one of her colleagues.

As we stand to be photographed Jayne notices a tiny mark beneath the windscreen. “That’ll never do,” she tuts, “hang on,” and reaches up to wipe it with her sleeve. Inside, the truck is cleaner than many hotel rooms. “I do like to keep it clean,” she shrugs. “I live in it, so I have to.” But it seems to me that love – not practicality – is at the root of such fastidiousness.

In the Garn tearoom, Jayne gets me a cup of tea and we settle down for a chat. Despite the fact that she lives just over a mile from the yard she spends Monday to Friday sleeping in her truck – even when working relatively locally. “Nine times out of ten I would rather sleep in here,” she says as we leave to collect a load of jelly, marmalade and tinned prunes from a nearby warehouse. “It’s really comfortable. I’ve got a microwave so I can pretty much cook whatever I fancy, then lie in bed watching TV. It’s perfect!” The night-heater and Jayne’s panic button, which has been fitted just in case of an emergency, make it an even more comfortable and safe experience.

She admits there are some drawbacks to being a woman in a male-orientated domain, but for Jayne Pell it’s nothing to dwell on – and she can certainly give as good as she gets. Consequently, being out alone on the road does not overly concern her. However, she does suspect some male colleagues take her less seriously when she complains about a technical problem on a vehicle. “But I just love it when I prove them wrong,” she says wickedly.

Her sense of humour clearly helps. When our photographer balanced precariously on a tall ledge to shoot through the cab window, Jayne seized the moment to scare him half to death with a loud toot on her horn. And when a male colleague was trying to reverse his truck she leaned out of the window and hollered, “D’you want me to do that love?”

And when she jumped energetically in and out of the cab, (while I huddled in the unbelievably comfy passenger seat, away from the cold Lincolnshire air), she
was wearing an authentic ‘Ambulance Aircrew’ jacket. “Where on earth did you get that?” I asked. “The owner was resuscitating someone by the side of the road,” she said dead-pan, “I nicked it.” My mouth fell open. “No!” she laughed, knowing she had got me again, “I bought it!”

We drive past fields of cabbages and freshly ploughed brown earth. Jayne avoids the puddles, (“I’ve just cleaned it!” she explains), and nods to other Garn drivers, telling me snippets about each character and funny anecdotes about driving at night. I learn that some houses never close their curtains and from the elevated vantage point of the cab she can sometimes see straight into bedroom windows. “Most of the time people are just watching TV,” she says, “But not always!”

For someone who has worked nights for four years Jayne shows no signs of fatigue, but admits that by Friday night she is too exhausted to go out, collapsing in front of the TV at home instead. She lives with a lodger and a cat but says that loneliness isn’t really a problem.

“I drive along listening to Talk Sport with my flask of coffee,” she says, (showing me where Scania has thoughtfully designed a space for it), “and listen to people like James Whale, who I love. Even golf can sound exciting on the radio and I particularly enjoyed the Olympics.”