September

I am going to arrive in Melbourne at the 10th September 2013.

I arragned a job for me there jet at a trout farm near Alexandria (about 100km northern from Melbourne) by help from Peter Jessen, a Danish friend I know from my internship in Denmark last year.

Arrival at Melbourne 11.Sep.2013

When I arrived in Melbourne after about 13 hours of flight and plenty of waiting hours at different airrports, I walked arround to see a bit of the city and made some pictures of great buildings. So this is Melbourns old train station.

Just some impressions from Melbourn ...
It was very nice to walk along this river. On the one hand it was very cold and a bit rainy and I was only wearing shorts and a thin pullover, so it got a bit cold by the time waiting for the bus to get to the farm,, but on the other hand I met a lot of very funny people. A complete airguitar-band und some girls giving out free hugs.

I had to wait the whole afternoon for my bus, so I arragend my bank account, got my cellphone card and all that stuff I needed - and besides alwys taking pictures of interesting buildings and peoples :-)

I was also at the harbour of Melbourne... All in all it is a very nice city I think. A very nice combination of old and very new buildings. Maybe I will come back here after a few weeks of working on the farm to spend some more time here.

29.09.2013 - About two weeks in Australia now

After about 2 hours in the bus from Melbourne I arrived in a small village near the fish farm. It was night and the bus driver asked me about five times if I am really sure, that I want to leave the bus HERE at this time. But everything went well and Ed came to pick me up.

So here you see were I lived for the first week. A great flat in the Ed´s garden. With my own livingroom, kitchen, bathroom, two bedrooms.... Everything you need. Food from his wife Sally, everything very nice. All in all a very good start for my life here in Australia.

This is a picture I took during one of my mountainbike trips up the hills arround here. Very lovely hills and quite a lot of animals. So at the moment this is one of my favourite hobbys here besides hunting, driving different vehicles, making fire and drinking beer with the fellas on the farm :-)

But there is also work, not only hanging around... This here on the picture is a typical work: grading the fish. I like the work here, it is allways funny with the guys from the farm. Only the weather is a bit strange. There is an Victorian saying: If you don´t like the weather - just wait a day. And yes it is really like this. Sometimes you have to wait only five minutes and the weather changes from burnging sun to rain like the end of the world :-D

This is the feeding truck - small but effective. It would be very hard to feed every day tons of fish feed by hand! And the most important thing in there is the shotgun; always on the passenger seat for all the cormorans arround here.

My job is also to examine the small fish for deseases. This must be done every second day, so they can treat the fish before a desease really starts. A good job especially on rainy days :-)

The view from the house, where I live at the moment, to the fish farm. There are four guys living arround the farm, so there is always somebody available for emergencys. This is also the place were we always meet making fire, drinking beer and delicious BBQs.

The Goulburn River - The river where the farm gets its water from; and this water comes from Lake Eildon. Very nice stream with small islands. Especially sitting on them for fishing :-)

Beau took me for a little trip uphill on a point with a very nice view. This is the official road up there... we also took some "special roads" to get there. Very funny trip and totally amazing where cars can go!

On the top of the hill. Not the best weather but an incredible view over Lake Eildon and the, only in this time of the year, green hills arround it. To get there we drove nearly one hour from the next city, only on very difficult roads - but there were still some houses up there. So there must be some people driving this track every day!

Another picture of the great view over this beautiful counrtyside. Forest and the lake as far as you can see.

This is Beau with his Ute (This is how the Aussis call their 4 wheel drives). A lot of people here drive these kinds of cars. Most of them very old models but they go nearly everywhere. On the farm we have some Landcruisers, too. On day I had to go down the road to the other part of the farm and the road was blocked by a truck, so what to do? Just right through the field besides the road through the next small creek and back on the road. :-) Unbelievable how much fun this can be!

The living room of Beau´s house, where I live at the moment. Like you can see he is a hunter and for the rainy days he has got a lot of movies and games. I feel a little bit like at a video store. Every movie I ask him for is somewhere in a drawer. :-)

A very good time so far here on the Goulburn River Trout Farm. The weather gets better and we have a lot of fun and a lot of work. Actually I learn again to go to bed early. Tomorrow we have to start at 4:30, so bed time at about 8 oclock. I feel a bit like in primary school! :-D