Australia Adventures: 8. Woofin' The Yurtfarm

'The core of ones spirit comes from new experiences'

G'day!

Which you believe its April already and have a track record of existing in the Land of Oz for 2 and a half months now and I'm still alive!

I've ended up in the tropics of Cairns, Far North Queensland and it is scorching hot!! I feel I can’t stand outside for too long as the heat is so overwhelming but hey better than the cold! I flew here after slumming it on the floor of Sydney airport, I felt homeless, nice insight into the world but 20 other people were doing it too. I pretty much got little sleep so I pretty much crashed out when I found this earthy backpackers in Cairns city. There has been an oil spill on the Great Barrier Reef which is not good for its well being. So finally having time to sit down and reminisce about the adventures.

The reason for my whereabouts up here in the Tropics I owe to two people I was rooming with in Sydney - with my funds rapidly depleting, one Australian girl was kind enough to give me a phone number of a Avocado farmer she knew near Cairns who might be harvesting soon. Without a doubt I called him up and he could give me a job in April.....which was two months away.....so I had to come up with a way to stall my spending till then. Word was on the 'backpacker scene' about a scheme called 'Willing Workers On Organic Farms' or 'WWOOFing' as its commonly known. This was an organisation (which is all over the world apparently) which acted kinda like a cultural exchange getting you off the tourist trail. You buy the book with a membership fee of $60 which lists all the farms in Australia who take volunteers to come help out on their farm and for 4 hours work you get food and board. No money spending from there on and boy my money was scarce and the farm life would be so novel for me, having not really been involved with a farm except the petting farms we would visit on school trips.

Flicking through the handy sized book (which I instantly warmed to being printed on recycled paper and with plant based ink), I first saw advertised in the Sydney area a number and brief description of a WWOOF farm called the ‘YurtFarm’ it was in a country town called Goulburn home of the giant 'Big Merino' statue, 3 hrs away from Sydney.
Now I actually have no real idea what a 'Yurt' was and I am one for novel, unfamiliar experiences so I went for it and gave them a call to ask if they needed any help. I was in luck, I could go in a few days and could easily catch a train straight there from the city. 

So I did......

and getting off into the small country town, I felt a sigh of relief to be out of the honeypot trap of Sydney and into the calmness of this little town with its buildings echoing the scene of a Western film set. I couldn’t get in touch with the farmers and then realised I would be needing some Wellington Boots - if I was going to be immersing myself in farm life for a while I needed the look for it. So I walked nearby and found an agricultural kind of place which catered for the labouring man (or women) but when I asked for 'Wellies' I got a strange look and was told 'Nah you mean Gum Boots' and taken to the Gum Boot department...... and that's when I saw them, we were the perfect fit......no other footwear needed.
After being preached to about Jesus by this old guy who introduced himself as Tony, now equipped with my hard wearing 'Boots' I was lucky enough to hitchhike up to the farm which was about 20kms out of the town, through the rolling hills and dusty road sides. Really it was pretty isolated but this was the adventure of it. I knew this was the right place as I recognised the farmers name on the cute little letter box on the roadside next to a sign clearly stating 'Yurtfarm' so you didn't have to be a moron to work it out.

I entered pushing the long wooden gate, closing it behind me of course remembering the Country Code - and was met by an old VW beetle with wooden figures dressed in clothes sticking out of it which sort of confused me and proceeded to walk with 'Boots' of course down the main path channeled by these glorious pink flowers flourishing in the summer bloom. A little down the path, I became surrounded by a tree house and psychedelic decorated trees and shed making it look like some peaceful hippy retreat with signs saying 'To the Meditation Garden'. It was so cute, just like you'd imagine a chocolate box idea of a proper farm, barn, tractor and horses...... 

Ahhhh!!!!

Two English girls Josie and Sophie and a German boy Flo had arrived the day before to start work there and told me I could find the farmers partner Judit who was busy shearing sheep in the barn when I turned up with two daughter Ruby and Tess. The farm was abundant with art work from past Wwoofers and cultivated the idea of a primitive 'Back to Basics' ethos which really attracted me to the place with various signs saying 'No T.V' and 'Live Life'. I knew I was going to like it....

Mike the farmer came home from town and showed me his Yurt Village about 2Km away from the main farmhouse on his 1175 acre sized land which he's been building since the 80's. I was extremely impressed with his self made village with 13 different coloured Yurts looking very much like giant cupcakes dotted around a lake. Mike invited youth groups and visitors to come stay in the village to learn how to be self sufficient and adopt a more country 'back to basics' lifestyle, something that has faded in the digital age of the today's world. But these places still existed and I was enchanted by the womb like bubble of the farm like Peter Pan's NeverNever Land where you don't have to grow up and are free to release your spirit in the simplicity of the place

In case you're wondering - a 'Yurt' is a wooden round house taken from the idea of the Mongolian Yurt tents and made into houses – they are WICKED everyone should have one. You can make them for any use, and they have open fires and are cheap to make. He got the idea to bring them to Australia when he was broke in the USA after the wool industry collapsed and was forced to close his Merino sheep farm. Mike discovered the Yurts at a self help centre in California and brought them to Australia as a new business in Goulburn and is pretty famous here for doing it, he was on the TV and had magazine interviews the lot.

Mike proudly showed me around his village after a quick knock of Ping Pong in one of the Yurts and was astonished to find he had constructed a crazy golf course, a sports field, a workshop where he would teach kids to build mini boats, a flying fox, a bathroom and two toilets whos walls were adorned with inspirational messages from past visitors and the like.

      Hand on heart - I absolutely loved the place and its ethics.

So life as a farmhand....its great fun and has given me the opportunity to do thing I'd never had the chance to do in life before. I'm kinda converting to a country girl. The great thing is that everyday was unpredictable and would wake up not knowing what we would be doing as everyday was never the same. We had our own WWOOF House which was a charming little cottage sharing it with the Huntsman Spider 'Spartacus' (you get used to them, they are harmless). We started work at 8:00am till 12:00pm where we squeezed in a 'Smoko' (a break), Mike getting out his guitar to sing us a few Aussie country songs 'Home Amongst the Gum Trees' and recite some Aussie poetry before the heat of the day crept up on us. I've actually wanted to do more than 4 hours because I had enjoyed it so much.

Insy, winscy Huntmans Spider....they're harmless

First glimspe of Boots and I....

I even learnt how to throw a boomerang which were primarily hunting tools by Aborigine huntsman....and it came back first time! haha

When kid camps came to the farm, we got stuck in helping out with them, learning how to herd sheep and light fires, taking care of the farm animals, picking fruit and just helping to entertain them even pretending to be a ghost in the forest ha! (now this is where my experience at USA summer camp came in handy)

The type of work we had to do involved us really getting stuck in regardless of your background or where you came from, which was the Australian country way of being - gravelling the roads, making signs, picking grapes, stripping bark, collecting firewood and even milking the old cow Princess like a maid..ahhhh

In our free time I would go running in the farmland, canoeing, golf, teaching the kids and Mike Tennis on his home made tennis court which is nice because we were also allowed to get involved in the families life as I would take Tess and Ruby to the country show, playing cricket, riding in the trucks with them and playing practical jokes. The sort of life I'd craved for such a long time. I was even around for Mike's 70th birthday so he had a big farm party from everyone he’s known for years rocking up to the farm.

My next blog will be about my night I spent in the Australian bush alone.....watch this space...

With Lonely Planet Travel Guide Australia 

Australia Adventures: 7. Major Wet Weekend, The Olympic Stadium and Meeting Godzilla!

I wanting to spend too much time in Sydney, my buddy Tahlz from summer camp put me up in her place in the suburbs of Sydney and offered to accompany me in visiting some highlights of the city even though it was atrocious weather. We got lost driving up to sample the buttery Northern Beaches still in the stormy rain (I seem to have ruined Sydney's summer) to show me ‘Summer Bay’ home of the Aussie Sitcom rival to Neighbours ‘Home and Away’ (I actually preferred Home and Away as a school girl) it wasn't exactly 'Summer Bay' that day anyway. You find some funky things on beaches though - I love them, when there's nobody there.

Not so Summer Bay

Returning to the city, Tahlz knew I was a sports fan and kindly whisked me over to the Olympic Park which staged the 2000 Summer Olympic Games when I was a wee 18 year old school girl. It was pretty magical to look out onto the Stadium where I had been glued to watching all the Athletic events ten years previously. The tour also included a peek inside the dressing room where the 2004 Rugby World Cup final was played so I took a seat in Jonny Wilkinson's cubicle....he didn't mind

Mmmmm they do spoil you in the Rocks....

'The Rocks' is a popular, quaint and charming little area of Sydney which is like the trendy place to hang out. Tahlz took me to a really popular pancake restaurant in The Rocks, something like 'Pancakes on The Rocks' or something like that. But boy, the pancakes were divine....I never will have another one again.
Now what else can you do on a rainy day in Sydney? well there's the Wildlife World and the Aquarium and guess what there was a 2 for 1 deal so we could go to both, how lucky to come on such a day. So off we trotted to spy some more Aussie animal friends which I think would have left Tahlz yawning at my eagerness to the Southern Hemisphere species spying the Red Kangaroo, a baby Koala (which I didn't get to hold booo) and the biggest crocodile I have ever seen in my life GODZILLA woah! seriously Australia's not for the faint hearted folk and in fact has the most venomous snake, spider, bird being the exotic turkey looking 'Cassowary', fish, octopus and something else.

Godzilla!!

Funky Aboriginal Kangaroos

Now the Sydney Aquarium, that's a treat walking through underwater glass tunnels amongst the daily life of Oz's rich and diverse marine life. Wow! quite a kaleidoscope of colours, oozing tropicano - its magical. I faced the introduction of the 'Dugong' on my 'I Spy Animals of the World' book - a real gem of Australia. They are adorable, nicknamed the 'Sea Cow' and 'Mermaids' (I couldn't really see their likeness to 'Ariel' the Disney mermaid though) and look very much like walruses....see for yourself

Speaking of Disney, it was very evident where Disney had got their inspiration for the cast of 'Finding Nemo' (that film did wonders for sea life) coming across the stars themselves in
the exhibit.....my favourites the Blue Tang very cool fish complete with a spike in the tail

                                                  Is that Nemo and Dory?

Not forgetting the forboding presence of the sinister Sharks, smirking at us with that jagged smile of theirs and the flashy jellyfish (which are actually really dangerous here), not forgetting the cool as a cucumber curious sea turtle checking us out. I cannot wait to get out into the Great Barrier Reef...

  

Sea life...all out to serve eachother, nice shady spot fishies???

My money is now zapped and gotta get out the city, so see you next time from where the footsteps will be going...

With Lonely Planet Travel Guide Australia 

Australia Adventures: 6. The Not-So-Blue Mountains...

I'm sharing a room with a number of girls (one is an old Irish Lady who sometimes acts like our Grandmother), a Belgium girl Angie and I took a day trip to visit the Blue Mountains near Katoomba west of Sydney - the mountains are part of the 'Great Dividing Range' and get their names from the mist of oil given off by the eucalyptus trees or 'gum trees' which are everywhere in Australia. Not that we could see them as the day we picked to go absolutely poured down with rain but our walking guide (who looked very much like Patrick Swayze, I thought anyway) did the best he could to make the day fun teaching us about how the Aborigines used 'Ochre' from the flakes of rock to paint artwork onto their 'Red Hands Cave' very interesting.

Despite the rain lashing down, we descended through the beautiful low climate rainforest to some monstrous waterfalls and gingerly treaded across the velocity of the water surges ahh!! was pretty intense and the National Park were thoughtful enough to put a sign up showing us 'You are Here' just to feed off my adrenaline

ever wanted to be on the edge of a waterfall?

good to know....

We soon found ourselves standing before The Three Sisters Rocks - the evidence of a legendary Aborigine tale of a sorcerer turning three sisters into rocks to avoid the advances of three young males. The bum deal for the sisters was that the sorcerer died before switching them back. Geez now that's bad luck.

Except errrr.... we couldn't see it.

Can't you see it Angie?

We ended our day in the mountains by riding the steepest railway in the world up an incline of 52 degree to the valley floor - wahooh, no really it was steep Indiana Jones would have been proud of me

Just what I love about travelling is the unpredictability of it - on the way back to the city we heard word that there had been a landslide, causing road closures so we had to take an alternate route back to Sydney for a further 3 hours - ha! but we did bring back a little souvenir from our day in the mountains

A little souvenir...a leech

With Lonely Planet Travel Guide Australia 

Australia Adventures: 5. The 'Big Smoke' of Sydney...

G'day! Howzit goin? (a phrase I am hearing all too often in the Land of Oz) well its February! and I'm usually used to it being the coldest time in my life....in London though but still we are smack bang in the middle of the Aussie summer so here's a new blog from my early days in my adventures around Australia.

After Melbourne, I crashed at a friend of the family for a few days and then hit the road for an  trip to the 'big smoke' the mistaken capital of the continent.....Sydney! in the new state of New South Wales. Of course I was heading into the honeypot of Australian tourism, but well advertised pretty things and places in the world are inevitably going to attract masses of people so its something you can't always escape if you've flown to the other side of the world only to miss out on.

I had my firsthand experience of Australia's east coast main rail network, the very accommodating 'CountryLink' for the 12 hour trip, making me realise this country is BIG compared to itty bitty England and the distances between cities and towns are HUGE. Of course the Aussie's don't think anything of it and would gladly drive three, four hours to see a friend. I like their style and they must love driving. Anyway, I arrived finally to the famous Sydney, the oldest and most diverse city that Oz has to show off, built around a stunning natural harbour rightly known as 'Darling Harbour' home of the Sydnarians beloved 'Harbour Bridge' and iconic 'Opera House' which essentially defines 'Australia' to the rest of the world. Of course, its home to 'that' beach, yes one of the most famous in the world....BBBBBondi......maybe. They even have a TV show over here about it, bit like the Aussie Version of 'Baywatch' but its real life. Not that Sydney is all about the lazy beaches. its pretty cultural with a ton of stuff on offer that could rival London....except London doesn't have a beach a bus ride away.

Anyway when I arrived at night (well after 12 hours it eventually came to night time), I had to go and pick the first hostel I could find which also happened to be one of the most expensive in town. with an in house cinema and pool on the top floor of the five floor building. Who needs it really. Anyway it would be a good base to crash and reorganise myself and look about finding a job as the temptation of the cities sure do suck the funds out of you. I'm getting pretty used to letting myself in to rooms and introducing myself to random strangers. Travelling is good character building in a way.

gave me some time to fix up my bank account and to just wander the streets of Sydney soaking up its scent surrounded by Aussie voices for a couple of days marvelling at the majestic Sydney Opera House and its Harbour Bridge sidekick.

Now the Harbour Bridge is nicknamed 'The Coat Hanger' and connects the north of Sydney to the central business district taking a whopping 8 years to build and a further $20 million to fund! - no wonder they love it aswell as using it as the centre piece for the New Years Fireworks. You can pay ridiculous prices to scale up it for a panoramic view of the city, but I just settled for the shoestring budget of getting a slightly downsized version for free by taking a good ole stroll across it.

Now you see the Opera House there, on the jetty on the Parramatta River now thats an impressive piece of architecture - it was actually designed by a Danish guy Jorn Utzon who funny enough quit the project before it was completed and opened in 1973! But credit to the Mr Utzon for the original idea, many people liken it to shells and orange segments but I have the idea is looks like a Cockatoos' head feathers when they're playing attention - still it exudes Australia's quirkiness and earthy identity. The inside is grand and beautiful, home to you've guessed it Opera, aswell as theatre, concerts and dance events. At night is when it soars like the stars.

Talking about quirkiness in Australia, I'm beginning to feel the excitement that I will be witnessing some very weird and wacky things in this country, but thats why you travel right? I'm pounding the pavements of the city to try and get a lead for a job as my money is zapping up, drinking 'Snake Bite' (a mix of beer and cider and black current juice - a beverage I enjoyed in my student days) and watching 'crab racing' in the 'Scubar' next door, keep them comin' I'll see you next time.



Go Crabbies Go!

With Lonely Planet Travel Guide Australia