Week 16 – 5th March – 11th March

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Our last day before we move to another orchard was a very short day. The boss knew it would be a short one so we were treated to a lie-in until 8am - sweet! Work started at 9am and 1 ½ bins later we were back on the bus and heading home. We did bugger-all for the rest of the day and just took it easy. The plan was to have a good cook-up in the evening accompanied by a large number of Toohey’s New Extra Dry - i.e. tasty beer. We got involved with some chunky T-bone steaks, lamb breast ribs, sautéed spuds and barbecued courgettes and red peppers. The meat here is well cheap - the T-bones were a steal at just under $11 - $3.60 each works out at under £1.50 each and they were as tasty as a tasty thing in tasty sauce. A day off beckoned the next day and Jay and I nearly succeeded in polishing off a crate of well-earned beer! It was quite a fun evening sat around the fire, which is the theme for every night, talking about lots of stuff.

Tuesday was spent doing as little as possible. I spent a while on my laptop writing all this up then went down to the library, where they have free Internet, and updated the blog. In the afternoon we got the news from Lorraine that they would no longer need more people at the other orchard. They had been crying out for people and they pay slightly better - just an extra couple of dollars per bin but every little counts. The main thing about the place was the fact that their trees are a bit smaller while the fruit was much bigger. As such, it would be easy to make more money because you’re not pissing about on a ladder as much and the larger apples fill your bin quicker. One of the guys who works there, having worked at my place previously, was doing 6-7 bins per day and said that I could easily do 9, of not 10 bins. That would be $300 per day! So I was a bit pissed off at missing that - if we had just gone for the first day then taken a day off, we would have at least been on the books and been guaranteed work for a while. But, hey, we needed a day off so I won’t beat myself up about it. On Wednesday we took it pretty easy as well - making a few phone calls (which lead to nothing) and buying some shrimps for the barby was about as exciting as it got. 2 days off is ok - not ideal, but ok. 3 days off is getting a bit shit - especially when you’re in a place just to work! I was so bored that I cleaned the BBQ - I swear it hasn’t been done for an eternity but I got it sorted! I’m convinced that it cooks better now and the food coming off it is much tastier!

On Thursday afternoon David, our supervisor from the orchard, dropped a couple of the lads off (they kept 2 people back to do some selective picking) so I thought I’d ask him if he had any work whatsoever. Unfortunately he didn’t, but he gave us a few names and then he thought he’d call his mum, Alison, to see if she had any work - she’s a supervisor on one of the vineyards. Good news - a German couple had just been sacked because the girl was caught being rubbish - being lazy and sitting down in the middle of work having a fag. Ironically, she called in sick the next day with a sore throat and was told to bugger off! It seemed like Dave’s mum was being a bit hesitant, but Dave reassured her that we were good workers and that she wouldn’t have any problems with us. Tom had something prospectively lined up elsewhere, so Jay and I took the jobs. It just goes to show that if you’re seen working your arse off, people tend to remember and won’t hesitate to do you a favour or put in a good word. I asked him when the next apple picking would be starting at his place and he said around the 20th. I told him that we’d ring a few days before to make sure we were on the list but he assured us that we’re definitely on the list already - it’s nice to be wanted back!

We were well chuffed to have work again. It would mean making our own way to work in the van, so we did a recce in the evening to make sure we knew were we were going in the morning - it was only 10 minutes away. That was fine by us - we wouldn’t have to be out of bed until 0615.

The Germans having surrendered their posts (history repeating itself once more!), us Brits went in to start work at 0700. Our new job title was the glamorous, if somewhat camp, ‘bucket boys’ and our job description was ‘chucking buckets’! What we had to do was ensure that all the pickers’ buckets (or ‘tungs’ on Cambodian!) never got full - we’re constantly replenishing them and chucking the grapes into the bins on the back of the tractor. A couple of lads at the hostel had done it elsewhere and said it quite hard yakka - do-able but a hard day. Well that’s bollocks - the first day was a piece of piss. $17 per hour, 0700 - 1730. That’ll do. I had loads of energy so I kept running back and fore to the tractor - bloody good workout. The full buckets only weigh about 5kg (11lb) and there were 4 of us in the middle row chucking them into the bins, so plenty of work. The day flew by and we got a beer at the end of it. There were a couple of pinot vines in amongst that cabernet sauvignon and sauvignon blanc that we were picking, the grapes from which wouldn’t be used. We got a nice big bucket of tasty grapes to take home with us!

Tom and Jay have contracted a nasty throat infection this week. It’s one of those bastard ones where your glands swell up, your throat is feeling awful, your necks muscles ache etc…and it’s just rubbish. Jay struggled a little bit at work because there’s a lot of shouting to tell people when buckets are full and stuff…but he managed fine. Tom’s work has been put off until Monday, but hopefully he’ll get something soon. Jay woke up for work on Saturday and said that there was no way he could go to work - his head was pounding and he felt even worse than the day before. I went in on my own and had to do the work of two people. There were a few more pickers though and we were picking on more rows so I really had my hands full. I had 12 pickers’ buckets to keep on top of (a few more than the 4 I had the day before!) but I relished the challenge - Alison kept asking me if I wanted a second pair of hands on my rows, but I felt like proving that I could do it myself, being the stubborn bastard that I am! It turned out to be a real scorcher - it peaked in the high 30s in the shade, which made it pretty hard. Fortunately, because you don’t really stop at all, I managed to switch off to the heat so the day flies by. Alison said at the end of the day that I was one of the best they’d had this summer, which was another nice pat on the back. She also told me that work would probably finish on Sunday, which was a bit of a pisser - we thought we had until Tuesday at least. She estimated that the picking would be finished around 3pm on Sunday so the job that 5 or 6 of us were going to do on Monday and Tuesday could now be done between 3pm and 5:30pm by the 35 Cambodians that she had been promised for the day. They like to do a 10-hour day because it’s not really worth their while coming for much less than that - they have to come from Melbourne each day, which is an hour-and-a-half away. They don’t all live together, so some of them are up around 4am and don’t get home until around 8pm! As such, they like to get as much money as possible, which is fair enough.

Sunday was our last day - because of this, Jay thought he’d come to work as he needs the money. He managed to work until 11am, which was a good effort considering how crook he was feeling. The Cambodians started work at a ridiculous pace - we filled two bins (400kg each) in the first 10-15 minutes of the day. That would normally take an hour! Jay and I were on the same row and were running around like blue-arsed flies. When he went home, I had all that to deal with on my own. Again, I refused to have any help - I had got a good system going! In the afternoon, we picked 1 row fewer, which meant more pickers per row - that was when I needed someone else, much to my disappointment! The day was over at 1430 and the beer tasted beautiful! The last days had been some of the hardest I’ve done and I was satisfied that I had earned my money! Alison gave me an extra half an hour on my time sheet in recognition of a good day’s work, which was cool of her. That saw the end of the hand-picking - the only harvesting left to do is the machine picking, which is done at night for some reason. We’ve been invited to their end-of-harvest piss-up in a week or two’s time - I mentioned that I like a spot of cooking, so I’ve been nominated head chef. I’ve got a few ideas of what to do - I reckon I’ll use some of the merlot or pinot grapes to make a tasty jus for some steaks or pork chops.

It would appear that work is a touch on the scarce side for the coming week. Either the farms have enough people or they’re waiting for their next crop. As I’ve mentioned, the apples at Dave’s place should be ready around the 20th, so I’ve now got a little over a week off. I got a call from Anne on Saturday - she’s decided to go back to the States at the end of April/beginning of May so wants to cram lots of stuff in before she leaves. She was thinking of going camping on Wednesday and was wondering if I fancied going along. Considering the lack of work, and the fact that camping’s cheap, I reckon I’ll go along. The plan is to go to Wilson’s Promontory, a beautiful national park and the most southerly point in Victoria. It’ll be nice to see a bit of the countryside - something I feel I haven’t done enough of. The only other thing I have planned is to go to the Melbourne Formula 1 Grand Prix with Jay next Sunday (18th). General admission tickets are only $100 (£40), which is pretty good value and it might be the only time that I’ll have the opportunity to go. Well I am meant to be on bloody holiday after all! Unfortunately, Tom can’t afford it because of his ankle injury and current illness. He’s been in a really bad way this weekend but he’s coming out of it - I reckon he’ll be back on form on Wednesday, by which time he’ll have had this virus for over a week.

I think that, provided the work is available, we’ll stay here for a while - it’s the best place I’ve been to save cash and it’s a very pretty part of the world. I’m just hoping that the picking is good when it picks up again - I’m setting myself a target of $200 per day, which should allow me to put a fair whack aside. I’d like to be able to stick it out for as long as possible, which I will do as long as the money’s good - and as long as we’re happy staying here. It’ll be worth it though - I think the next leg of our adventure, the east coast, will be a lot of fun. My brother Chris will be coming for a couple of weeks at the end of April/beginning of May, so I’ll need to make sure I have enough cash to do cool stuff with him - all the more reason to keep going with the work! It’s a shame that we’ve reached the point where we have to spend more time working than travelling, but it’s a necessary evil. Doing this kind of work certainly makes you appreciate the simple things in life, though. When you see first hand how much work goes into growing and harvesting the crops, it makes you sick at the prices that supermarkets buy/sell them for. I shall be making a concerted effort not to buy cheap fruit and veg from the evil Tescos of this world! People work bloody hard to meet the demand for these products and I think it’s only fair that they’re fairly compensated. On that note, I shall sign off for another week. With any luck, the next update won’t be so heavily based upon the day-to-day life of a farm worker! Hopefully, stories will abound of lovely Victorian countryside, incredible beaches and the roar of the F1 engine!

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