So it been 2 months and 5 days of amazing travels before finding myself back at good old Fruitshack. I must say I was highly exited. I was prepared for a different experience this time with twise as many people ready for the grapeseason, but I didn't really know what to expect.
The shack looked exactly as I remember it. The dirty bathrooms, messy kitchen, the double decker, the goonroom with the same smell of old beer and cigarettes and then of course; all the 27 cats. I ended back in my same old room, which I now shared with a German girl and British Saffron and Kelly.
There's only one major thing that makes the difference from my last stay. I don't know anyone. (Except from German Ben who arrived to the shack just the day before we left in December). It's wierd thought, that all of sudden I was 'the new girl' even if I've been there the longest. Everything looked the same, but everyone is different. And the amount of people!! Thank god that I'm good with names.
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It turned out that it'd be at least another week before the grapes would start, so we all had a lot of days off during this period of time. And as there's basically nothing to do around everyone ended up spending way to many nights doing what backpackers does best; drink! Which true is good fun, but easily put you in a lazy hangover mood the next morning and way to many hours in from of the TV with chocolate bars and crisp. We did manage to walked into town together one of my first day spending a few hours in the park drinking bottled beer and chatting around. We got ourselves to the river one day and I few of us made it to the pool another. I got myself and a few of the other girls into running every day and luckily I ended up being one of the few getting a smaller job from Michael spraying weeds every morning for a few days.
We had a birthday party for one of the French girls that Friday. As both me and British Adam were out of beer and none of us got a car we decided to ride the bikes into town. Now this is the worst bikes I have ever used, and halfway there it started to rain. To top it all the police stopped us for not wearing helmets. It's an Australian law for everyone to wear helmets or the fine would be about 66 dollar. To get away without the fine we made ourselves look like stupid tourist pretending we just arrived to the country and simply didn't know better. They let us get away with it even if we had to turn back, in the wind and the rain to get ourselves a helmet which made us look even more stupid.
Grapeseason
Finally, after 10 days delay the grapeseason was ready to be started. Me and Kelly woke up that morning singing 'I'm so exited, I just can't hide it', while Anton played 'Facination' on the loudest volume in the kitchen when we all where having breakfast. Everyone seemed to keep up their best mood ready for hard work. We all headed out in the field and got given a pair of kippers and a name tag for our buckets. We teamed up, 4 people on every row starting from opposite ends working towards eachother. There were 24 of us picking with three 'bucket boys'. Their job was to counting and emptying our buckets into the tractor bin that Michael later's driving to the winery. I got teamed up with a lonesome German girl. She's living in her car and have no intentions of socialize with anyone. However, she turned out to be super nice, even if acting a bit weird, and we ended up chatting the hours away. The day's went by super fast and after 3,5 days of early mornings, early nights and 138 buckets we finished the first variety of grapes. Saffron, Kelly, Anton and I came with Michael to the winery that afternoon to follow the winemaking process. We got promised that we could taste some but since we didn't bring our ID we wasn't allowed too. Even if it was obvious that we're all over 18 coming straight from picking field.
To get enough people ready for the grape harvest Michael got more people come to the shack this weeks. People had to move into the bus, tents and sleep in their cars to make room for everyone
Fruit picking, or even farmwork is clearly not for anyone, and you'll constantly hearing people moan about it. Most of them stick around to it anyway, some of them simply just leave. Micheal got us 5 more Swedish girls the first weeks in the grapes. They lasted a week. The very first day in the grapes, even the first hour - two German girls couldn't even survive the day, and when they thought that no one was around the sneaked away from the field, grabed their stuff and escaped without a word with no intention to ever come back!!
We started off with the new variety of grapes in the beginning of next week. We finished every field faster than expected, and by the end of that Thursday we finished the second variety. Since the winery wouldn't let us start the last variety just yet we got a orange picking job lined up during the weekend.
I love orange picking, and climbing those threes like a little child. Beeing on top of the ladder, falling into the tree reaching for the ones I never thought I'd be able to reach. Just love it. It wasn't as easy the second day thought as we all had a massive drink the night before celebrations Phil's 23rd birthday. Rounds and rounds of flipcup and 3man throughout the night turned out not to be the best way to prepare yourselves for a full day of orange picking. We did allright thought as It was 10 of us picking all together. And since we got Alina as one of them you can possibly not end up laughing. She's one of the most positive and energetic person I've ever met. And funny- without having the intention to. No needs for sit-ups, a conversation with her and you'll laught yourselves to a six pack. She might not be the fastest picker, or hardest worker but she does put a smile on peoples faces.
Two more days off and we're back in the grape field for the last variety. It took us only another few days and by Friday afternoon we could simply congrat ourselves for finishing the 2014 grape harvest.
Toorak Harvesting
Since I hadn't had a hourly paid work for a while (by choice since I rather picked oranges for 30 dollars a day only to climb the lovely ladders) Michael offered me a 12 hours nightshift job at the nearby winery that weekend. Basically I was picking grapes using a harvest machine. There was three of us working, one driving the harvest over the vines, one driving the tractor next to it. The machine is separating the grapes from the vines, into the machinery and over a conveyor to the back the tractor. My job was to stand on the harvest and keep the machinery clean by keeping sticks away and make sure that no grapes gets stuck. Quite easy job as I didn't had to do it constantly. As soon as I got to the winery that night they put me straight into one of the tractors to drive to the field. I did try to say that I've never been driving one before, even if I'd love to try. All alone in the front seat I followed the harvesters every turn and a bumpy 5 k later, and still alive I got myself and the tractor to the right field. I had so much fun, in the tractor, in the dark, on the wrong side of the road! Considering that I started by midnight I was beeing responsible trying to get as much sleep as possible that day instead of hanging out with my friend who was drinking in the goone room. The guy driving the tractor did simply not share the same way of thinking and got dropped off by a drunken kid coming straight from an Australian bogan party. As we was right next to him in the field we could constantly see him letting his face head bang the steering wheel. He didn't last the whole night.
I was prepeard for a cold night by literally putting all my warm clothes on. Saying that means leggings and hoodie which wasn't even close to enough as it turned out to be a super cold -under 10 degrees- night. In between my pulling sticks sessions I went inside chatting to the driver to keep myself from freezing and to keep him awake. He even let me drive for a while just to try it, and for me to be able to say that I actually have been driving a harvest machine.
I managed to get a few hours of sleep back at the shack before I woke up by a phonecall from the farmer asking me to come back the very same night. Beeing to tired and to confused to even know what time of the day it was I said yes without fully understand what I was saying yes to. The second night ended up beeing harder than the first one, probably because I didn't got enough sleep. And we worked faster as we got another tractor driver this night who obviously didn't need to stop for a leg stretcher in between every row to keep himself awake. I still enjoyd it just as much!
By the end of the day (morning?) I realized that I somehow manage to loose my phone somewhere in the field. Which is funny since Ben found it in the fruitshackbus just the day before, after it being gone for over a week. Well I'm not getting it back this time. Learn from my mistakes and don't put your phone in the zip less pocket of your hoodie when you're bending over!
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