I finally did it!
Moved countries, that is.
Farm life is a huge change, but one that I needed. It's bloody hard work - being summer, we tend to work when it's light, so approx 6am (coffee before work, always) to 8pm. At the moment we're building a new chookhouse and enclosure, rewiring some fences, slashing paddocks to reduce fire risk, hauling firewood, and starting to mark out where the veranda will go on the house extension. There is a list of things to do as long as my arm, and we've split them up into 2 person jobs and 1 person jobs...that way we can always work depending on our mood.
My mate Psalm has Aspergers, so we're working really hard on communicating well. He's still learning how I think and what might piss me off, and vice versa. Generally though, we work really really well together. I think he's chuffed to have a guy mate around to be immature with. He can get it out of his system while his partner is working in Sydney during the week, and (theoretically) stop giggling at stuff like Hormone Rooting Gel during the weekends when she's home.
We are in the middle of nowhere. Really. There are 12 people in the Paupong area, spread over 3 farms, all of which are huge. This one is 2500 acres and it's the smallest. As Psalm points out though, it's more of an estate. One of the neighbours is basically the epitome of the Man From Snowy River, and he runs a few hundred sheep in our paddocks, but other than that it's just one huge wildlife reserve really. Regularly spotted animals include wombats, foxes, kangaroos, wallabies, deer, pigs and dingoes (scaaaary). Psalm and his partner are animal lovers and refuse to let anyone on the property to shoot, although the pigs are becoming a problem. Aside from the native wildlife, we enjoy the company of 4 dogs (Maddy the Helpie - kelpie heeler cross, Tobin the mastiff, Spanner the kelpie and Ella the baby kelpie). Ella is my puppy. Training a sheep dog is a tough task, they're naturally arrogant and hyperfocus on things which makes it hard to get them to listen. But, we're making progress. She actually seems more interested in mustering me than sheep, and shows an interest in cattle too, even though they're 50 times her size. Oh, and there are cats - Weasel and Dax. We are getting 2 horses and 3 alpacas soon....eep.
Cilla is settling in really well. She adjusted to being an inside cat pretty quickly, which makes me happy. Once the chookhouse is done, we're going to put a cat flap through to that from her so she can flit between where I sleep and having an enclosed outside bit to watch me from. Meantime, I've been taking her outside for supervised time for a bit each day. It's not that I think she'll run away, but it's snake season here, and Australia has 23 of the 25 most deadly snakes in the world.
Getting used to the fact that everything in Australia will try to kill me is interesting. No wearing shorts in long grass. Actually, avoid long grass altogether if possible. No going near water after dawn on a hot day, unless you make one hell of a racket. Assume that every spider will kill you. Never lift anything off the ground unless you lift the edge farthest from you first - snakes like to hide under stuff in the grass. Pretty much every ant has a nasty bite. Centipedes are toxic. There is even a poisonous tree that is deadly. There's one on the property, yaaaaay!
I am gearing up to post pictures.
In conclusion: I am HAPPY. I wondered if that would ever happen...
Farm life is a huge change, but one that I needed. It's bloody hard work - being summer, we tend to work when it's light, so approx 6am (coffee before work, always) to 8pm. At the moment we're building a new chookhouse and enclosure, rewiring some fences, slashing paddocks to reduce fire risk, hauling firewood, and starting to mark out where the veranda will go on the house extension. There is a list of things to do as long as my arm, and we've split them up into 2 person jobs and 1 person jobs...that way we can always work depending on our mood.
My mate Psalm has Aspergers, so we're working really hard on communicating well. He's still learning how I think and what might piss me off, and vice versa. Generally though, we work really really well together. I think he's chuffed to have a guy mate around to be immature with. He can get it out of his system while his partner is working in Sydney during the week, and (theoretically) stop giggling at stuff like Hormone Rooting Gel during the weekends when she's home.
We are in the middle of nowhere. Really. There are 12 people in the Paupong area, spread over 3 farms, all of which are huge. This one is 2500 acres and it's the smallest. As Psalm points out though, it's more of an estate. One of the neighbours is basically the epitome of the Man From Snowy River, and he runs a few hundred sheep in our paddocks, but other than that it's just one huge wildlife reserve really. Regularly spotted animals include wombats, foxes, kangaroos, wallabies, deer, pigs and dingoes (scaaaary). Psalm and his partner are animal lovers and refuse to let anyone on the property to shoot, although the pigs are becoming a problem. Aside from the native wildlife, we enjoy the company of 4 dogs (Maddy the Helpie - kelpie heeler cross, Tobin the mastiff, Spanner the kelpie and Ella the baby kelpie). Ella is my puppy. Training a sheep dog is a tough task, they're naturally arrogant and hyperfocus on things which makes it hard to get them to listen. But, we're making progress. She actually seems more interested in mustering me than sheep, and shows an interest in cattle too, even though they're 50 times her size. Oh, and there are cats - Weasel and Dax. We are getting 2 horses and 3 alpacas soon....eep.
Cilla is settling in really well. She adjusted to being an inside cat pretty quickly, which makes me happy. Once the chookhouse is done, we're going to put a cat flap through to that from her so she can flit between where I sleep and having an enclosed outside bit to watch me from. Meantime, I've been taking her outside for supervised time for a bit each day. It's not that I think she'll run away, but it's snake season here, and Australia has 23 of the 25 most deadly snakes in the world.
Getting used to the fact that everything in Australia will try to kill me is interesting. No wearing shorts in long grass. Actually, avoid long grass altogether if possible. No going near water after dawn on a hot day, unless you make one hell of a racket. Assume that every spider will kill you. Never lift anything off the ground unless you lift the edge farthest from you first - snakes like to hide under stuff in the grass. Pretty much every ant has a nasty bite. Centipedes are toxic. There is even a poisonous tree that is deadly. There's one on the property, yaaaaay!
I am gearing up to post pictures.
In conclusion: I am HAPPY. I wondered if that would ever happen...