The art of Goldfish Racing Hello I am alive!! Sorry for going dark the last few days – Cairns ended up being a total rainy wash out, so other than the rafting I didn't get up to much. Here is a quick rundown of what has gone on since my last post;
So today, was my first day at the Station. It started off fairly slowly watching Luke and the other girl here (Nena) fix the loader (a truck type thing), which blew a hydraulics hose the other day… apparently the loader is a piece of equipment that is very similar to Ikea furniture – there’s always some extra bits left over once put (back)together! Unconcerned by a few extra bolts we shifted some heavy pallets and then myself and Nena headed out to fill up the salt lick toughs and check on the water holes... I wonder if I will ever get my bearings out here, I thought I was good with directions but one piece of red dust and a bush looks very much like all the other bits of red and bush out here!
After lunch I got to fulfil one of my dreams to drive a really big truck really slowly, it was fab maybe I was a trucker in a past life? Whilst I drove the others rolled out a water pipe that will help pump water into one of the biggest reservoirs at the Station. The whole of Queensland is in severe drought so conditions have been very tough for the poor ol’ cows out here, and the water level is seriously low in the reservoir so this was a pretty important job.
Unfortunately I forgot to take my camera with me so I didn't get a chance to take any snaps of all our hard work today – I will do my best to remember to take it with me tomorrow. I have taken a couple of photos of the station at sunset for you to browse... but annoyingly they won't load right now - but you can see them on my FB page.
Insect alert – saw lots of very red bummed red back spiders whilst loading up the water pipes eep. :S, also not strictly an insect but there are LOTS of lizard things in the house!
- Goldfish Racing in Cairns
- Caught a bus to Townsville on Friday, naturally the weather in Cairns picked up!
- Spent 4 nights in Suzy’s beautiful home (mother of the guy whose Station I will be working at)
- Met little Gemma who is also staying at Suzy’s, is from the UK and who has just got back from 2 months working on a Station managed by one of Suzy’s daughters.
- Saturday the two Gemmas hit Townsville and the Mad Cow bar pretty hard – in the process met some AFL coaches who turned out to be a riot (and pretty easy on the eyes too!)
- Sunday rolled in at 4am, so thank god I changed my bus to leave 7am on Tuesday rather than leaving the same day.
- Tuesday took a 10 hours 45 minutes bus trip inland to Cloncurry and then another 1.5 hours to the Station which is just outside of the town of McKinlay. (Famous for the Crocodile Dundee hotel, as featured in the film)
- Baptism of fire at the Station L
So today, was my first day at the Station. It started off fairly slowly watching Luke and the other girl here (Nena) fix the loader (a truck type thing), which blew a hydraulics hose the other day… apparently the loader is a piece of equipment that is very similar to Ikea furniture – there’s always some extra bits left over once put (back)together! Unconcerned by a few extra bolts we shifted some heavy pallets and then myself and Nena headed out to fill up the salt lick toughs and check on the water holes... I wonder if I will ever get my bearings out here, I thought I was good with directions but one piece of red dust and a bush looks very much like all the other bits of red and bush out here!
After lunch I got to fulfil one of my dreams to drive a really big truck really slowly, it was fab maybe I was a trucker in a past life? Whilst I drove the others rolled out a water pipe that will help pump water into one of the biggest reservoirs at the Station. The whole of Queensland is in severe drought so conditions have been very tough for the poor ol’ cows out here, and the water level is seriously low in the reservoir so this was a pretty important job.
Unfortunately I forgot to take my camera with me so I didn't get a chance to take any snaps of all our hard work today – I will do my best to remember to take it with me tomorrow. I have taken a couple of photos of the station at sunset for you to browse... but annoyingly they won't load right now - but you can see them on my FB page.
Insect alert – saw lots of very red bummed red back spiders whilst loading up the water pipes eep. :S, also not strictly an insect but there are LOTS of lizard things in the house!
RSS Feed