A Great Big Ol' Convoy is Happening for John Grygorcewicz on Saturday

Wednesday, 24 June 2020 13:04

A convoy of trucks will be leaving the Drumbo Truck stop on Saturday and heading to the Sakura House to pay tribute to a long haul trucker John Grygorcewicz.

OXFORD COUNTY - You may notice a huge convoy of trucks rolling through Oxford county on Saturday.

They are meeting at the Drumbo Truck Stop and then driving to Sakura House in Woodstock to pay respects to John Grygorcewicz. John's daughter Stef Eygenraam says her dad has been a long haul trucker since 1989 and has been working at JBT Transport in Ayr for several years.

"That has always been a really big part of his life and our life as a family. The diagnosis happened really fast, it has only been about a month since he got the diagnosis of Stage 4 cancer. It has spread to multiple parts of his body already and the decline has been very fast for him. So my brother just wanted to do this kind of tribute to him and just kind of a final send off, I guess, we don't expect that we have very much time left. We thought it would be something small and my brother would drive my dad's truck and lead it and maybe a few friends would join in. We didn't expect the kind of response that we got from friends, family and even strangers who have reached out to us too."

John's son Steve Grygorcewicz, who is also a long haul truck driver came up with the idea to do a convoy for their father so some of his friends could pay their respects.

"We didn't expect the response that we have got, my first original thought on the whole thing was a tribute to our dad, because everything happened so fast and with COVID right now and the restrictions on people that a lot of friends, weren't going to be able to say goodbye. So what I thought was just going to be a handful of trucks, because we are in this industry and I have been in this industry for almost 20 years, thanks in part to my dad and it just kind of blew up."

They will be leaving the truck stop at 1:30 pm and only the first and last truck will toot their horn to respect the other residents of Sakura House. Steve is not sure how many trucks will join the convoy, but everyone is invited, you don't have to drive a transport to take part. He says the reaction has been phenomenal and they wouldn't be surprised to see anywhere from 10 to 100 trucks take part.