Alex

Hello again,

I’m afraid there’s not too much of interest to report for the last couple of weeks, I’ve settled into the Tully routine of getting up at 5am (which is painful after a heavy night!) and going to work five days a week. Work itself is excellent and I’ve been varying the routine a little by helping repair some huge submersible pumps recently, although we’ve also been battling with some terrible old paddocks full of chokes (were two trees grow together squeezing the water pipe, stopping the flow) which means we have to dig out the trees with really sharp shovels, which is knackering work in the heat. After a particularly hard day Marilyn my supervisor showed me and Evan a really nice swim spot about a mile away from the sheds (love the quad bike ride) and said we could go everyday before lunch or arvo smoko whenever its hot.

“Yeah this is where the boys usually go for a swim before smoko. Crocs? Ah yeah theres a couple, but no worries, you’ll be right”……. ummm…

Evan and Eagor

We’ve also had some really bad weather too – torrential rains and a very close shave with Cyclone Hamish (which would have potentially destroyed all the farms in the area), and unfortunately my feet have been so wet I got Tinea (Athletes foot). However this isn’t the British sweaty-trainer-itch, this is the tropical, painful, swollen, limp-down-the-street version which put me in my bed for a while but has finally gone down now.

Having a laugh here at the hostel on the weekends, especially friday nights which often turn out very messy! I’ve made some good friends, and said goodbye to a few too as there’s a lot of people coming and going, and tens of people trying to get in as apparently there are ‘no jobs in Australia’, which I’ve heard from a lot of people. One of my roommates has just driven from Sydney to get work here, which is pretty much like driving from London to Istanbul, which makes me appreciate my job even more!

I probably won’t be updating the blog quite so often as I’ll be staying here for a few months now, but I’m still waiting on Team Canada for a Cairns trip, I still see skydivers landing from my balcony, Mount Tyson has yet to be scaled and I WILL win a rafting trip on the Trivia night, so I’ll post as I do things!

Hope alls well, take care, Al x

Yeehaa!

Hello all,
Well I could really see myself working here for a few months! I really enjoy my job which it turns out is the actual best job on the farm – also my supervisor is great and the other day gave me a map so she doesn’t have to show me where to go even! I have a free reign! Today me and Evan did two paddocks – probably about 6,000 sprinklers spraying 15,000 trees – and they were both considered small paddocks.
Usually its all good fun, getting drenched when its hot, going for a bit of a ride about on the quads, ploughing through waist deep mud, stopping off for a cigarette whenever you fancy… the one downside is the amount of spiders! They all make a web between the banana trees so as your walking around the sprinklers their dangling at exactly nose height – and its not just a matter of squeamishness, these things can kill you! )
Actually a ridiculous thing happened last week – as I was on the bus back from work the sun was beating down on the right side of my face, so I put my straw hat against the window, leant against it and fell asleep. When I got off I happened to glance in the hat and there was a mug-rim-size black beefy spider just sat there! This thing was about an inch from my ear for half an hour! It caused a bit of a scene as it scuttled up the pavement after I got off, and none of the guys fancied my chances if it had bitten me on the temple!
Hostel life is good too – there’s a good crowd here, I think there’s 120 people staying at the moment so there’s always someone to talk to or something going on, although Tully itself is a bit of a ghost town at the weekend.

The crew at Alligators Nest.

We went to Alligators nest on Saturday which was a great swim spot, the water was nice and cool and we just messed about for hours going from the sun to the water and back.
I’m starting to settle into something resembling a routine now after many weeks of madness, but Travis (Team Canada) phoned the other day and they’ll be in Cairns in a week or two so there may well be some more madness in store soon! Hope your all well, take care, Al x