Advertisement
Published: October 4th 2011
Edit Blog Post
Well the last couple of months we have lived the simple life cut-off from civilization on a remote farm in Denmark, on the south west coast. We really didn’t know what to expect when we headed into the wilderness but it was a totally different experience to anything we have done! There were bugs a plenty, farm animals and laughs as well as many testing times!!
After our 7 hour journey to Denmark we were picked up in a rickety van by 3 of the workers already on the farm, the van felt like it might crumble at any point so we were amazed to even reach the farm. We were greeted by 6 fellow workers who we were to share accommodation with – a German couple, 2 South Korean guys and a couple of guys from England and Guernsey. When we saw our room it took us a while to find the bed through all the cow-webs and spent the rest of our night clearing away the legions of spiders and daddy long-legs that had set up camp!!
The next morning we were into our farm gear and wellies that would become our daily dress for the next
couple of months. We were thrown straight into the deep end making mud-bricks, which consisted of shoveling mud and cement into a cement mixer and wheel-barrowing the loads to be set into bricks – after 4 and a half hours of this our muscles were ready to snap. Just a wee change from our cosy office chairs in Perth!! Our main job was helping to build a mud-brick house which Ellen and Rani (the owners) were eventually going to live in. Making the bricks took up our first couple of weeks and then we became a couple of brickies laying the bricks that we’d made. The glamour!
We only worked until 12.30 which meant the rest of the day could drag like hell. The first couple of weeks the weather was on our side so we managed to see some stunning spots that were on Denmark’s doorstep – we went fishing and Paul caught his first ever fish (a whopping one pounder!!!), saw Ocean Beach and Green Pools - easily the most stunning beaches we’d seen in Australia, walked the tree top walk in the Valley of the Giants and visited the famous blow-holes of Albany.
The weather
was too good to be true and soon turned to massive downpours meaning we got the occasional day off but made our days verrrry long!! This became even worse when our trusty van broke down so there was no escape, it was a bit of a mental challenge trying to keep ourselves sane – there’s only so many times you can play monopoly and scrabble over and over again!!
At times it became like the Big Brother house – we’d have arguments over our weekly shopping lists, whose turn it was to cook and who should be in charge of feeding the chickens! (yes we had chicks, ducks, geese and turkeys all on our doorstep!). You know you’re bored when you find yourself hiking up Mount Lindsay or hitching your way into town just to get off the farm!
We could hardly contain our excitement when Ellen told us of Denmark’s 100th Anniversary Festival (surely made world news?!). To get a couple of days off from laying bricks we managed to convince Ellen it would be a great idea to let the workers have their own cake stall – que ‘Travellers Treats’. This ended up in an all
day cooking session, preparing scones at six in the morning. We were chuffed when we made a $12 profit each. Score! That night Ellen invited the 5 of us that were left to a BBQ along with her friend Candy. We still refer to this as ‘the night’ because we’ve never experienced anything like it in our lives, her friend had the dirtiest mouth this side of anywhere! We can’t repeat everything but we can tell you she introduced herself to us by asking Ellen and Rani (the two woman who ran the farm) ‘who wears the strap-on?’- mouths were aghast , burgers were nearly dropped but this was just the tip of the iceberg and the conversation plummeted to unbelievable depths!!
As much as the boredom could get to us we had some really good times on the farm aswell. Ellen was really generous, and took us to a couple of wineries which was great. Feeding the animals became a highlight of the day, and we took a right shine to Hamish & Angus the 2 highland cows on the farm! We also got on well with the guys on the farm and on some days it was
the banter that pulled us through, teaching Domi who was from South Korea to sing ‘Flower of Scotland’ was a classic!!
‘Ode to a Haggis’!! We also learned a valuable lesson during our stay which is to watch what you boast about when you’ve had a drink! One night with all the crew and Ellen, we had got a bit too patriotic and shot our mouths off about how we cook a mean haggis. We thought it had been forgotten but on our last week Ellen let us know she had arranged a haggis night for our last Saturday so ‘could we please cook a haggis dinner for around 25 people from scratch’ (uh-oh, we’d never cooked it before!) and also ‘kindly recite a bit of Rabbie Burns poetry on the night’ (eh!). After being delivered with around 20 sheep hearts, kidneys and liver and a lovely streak of cow spleen we now believe you can’t call yourself Scottish until you have ‘really’ cooked haggis!! After the 7 hour ordeal of preparing it, and the smell was unreal, it ended up being a great Scottish celebration. Ellen had arranged for a piper, our haggis, neeps and tatties went
down a treat and we even took to the floor to give a reading of ‘Ode to a Haggis’ – no one can say we haven’t done our best to show off a bit of Scots culture down under!!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.108s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 11; qc: 51; dbt: 0.0634s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Betty Barnes
non-member comment
What a Terrific Write-Up!
Although I have so enjoyed your blog posts, this is IMHO the best ever! What an experience! Our staying at a working sheep farm B&B in Scotland while I was there fades to dull in the light of your experience. What incredible memories you now have. Um . . . relax, I won\'t ask you to prepare haggis while you\'re with us. Really. Don't bother. ;) Now, on the other hand, we could have a tamale-making party if you wish. Much more fun, less work and certainly less . . . odorous! Thanks for sharing this. Can\'t wait to see you both! Much love to ya'll!