The 3rd morning I woke
up in Australia it was cold but I looked up out of my window and saw a clear
blue sky. It was way before 8 so I made myself a cup of tea turned on my
electric blanket to the maximum and crawled back in bed with my lovely book.
By eight o’clock I
stood up and went to feed the horses with the other girls. How good can a day
start?
Gosh, so much to say
where ever shall I start ?!
Lets start at the
beginning, yes, that sounds right.
So, on the 31st
of October I arrived in Kyabram after almost 6 hours (and about 36 hours before
that) of travelling from the airport to the Southern Cross Station where I
hopped on a train heading for Murchison east where I took a bus to Kyabram
where I would meet Jan who’d bring me to my final destination for the following
2 months.
I arrived at the
Northern Warmblood Stud of Peter & Jan Powels after a long long day meeting
3 wonderful girls. Inge(borg) from
Norway, Noemie from France and Jenny
from England (in the mean time Laura from Germany and Jocelyn form Canada
joined us). Because my luggage got stuck in Singapore with the transition of
flight company Jan and the girls were ever so kind to lend me some old clothes
that were left behind by previous Helpx’ers so I could get started. Without any
of my riding equipment I didn’t really have all that much to do so I assisted
the girls where I could in their daily business. On day 5 my luggage arrived
(FINALLY) in the afternoon (where I am my mother ever so grateful for with
helping me find my lost luggage, so thank you mommie Love you!). With my
luggage back safe and sound the fun could start. The same evening I got
everything back I rode Betina (Peter’s 17 year old hunting mare), it was lovely
to be back in the saddle again and it is going to happen everyday from now on
so that’s really exciting news. There are 3 stallions (Favous, Fasolt &
Bertie), 3 mares (Nina, Valentine & Betina) who need to be ridden and than
the 3 younger horses (Barenger, Fergil & Florina) who need to be lunged and
trained almost everyday. We started lunging Florina with a passoa since last
Tuesday, she’s taking it so well. So that’s happening everyday.
When we’re not mucking
out stables, feeding the horses, riding them, breeding with them or just
training them we don’t really do all that much. We go to town about twice a
week in the afternoon so that’s how much Wi-Fi I have (and I’m loving it quite
frankly). When the sun is at its hottest (from approximately 2 to 5-6 p.m.) we
do nothing, that is to say; watch movies or just chill in the shades or the sun.
We’ve already had days with 32° burning sun at noon, we slightly change our day
along with the weather. We start working with the horses at 7 a.m., feeding at
half past and than commencing the working at about half pas 8 when we’ve had
breakfast on warmer days. Tea time (what an totally awesomesaus time?!) is
round 11 o’clock that’s the time I do a
lot of reading with some tea, an apple and some morning sunshine. I’m so in
love with the sunshine over here! It can burn like hell and, of course, I
already got burnt and got sunscreen (the banana boat one ;) but never the less
the wind is out a lot so that makes it very bearable to ride the horses in the
sun. By the time we have lunch all together it’s about one, after that we just
sit and chill, this is when I do the most of my blogging. Wednesday Steve
(friend of Jan & Peter who’s breaking in Barenger) took us to his friend
who sells these awesomesaus cowboy hats (YAY, a real cowboy hat)! He didn’t
have any in stock in our sizes but he would order them so in a few weeks most
of us are going to be proud owners of a real cowboy hat (probably an American
one though).
On hot days (30-37°C) the
sun doesn’t stop burning until round about 6 o’clock that’s about the time we start
taking the horses back in, often ride some we didn’t in the morning and feed
them. After the horses are all happily eating we take our showers and go down
to the house for dinner with Jan & Peter by 7 or 8 o’clock (depends on the
weather, on cooler days we eat around 7 otherwise at 8 or later). By the time we’ve
all eaten, had dessert (dessert, every frikin’ evening say whaaat?! (gained
like 5 kg already I think) and washed the dishes it’s about 9 (depending on
what time we start eating). Usually that’s the end of the day after that we
trail of to bed.
There isn’t a day
going by without me being ever so grateful to the world that I got the chance
to be here, living the/my dream.
I am living my dream and I’m enjoying every
minute of it.
Talk to you soon, love you all
Lizzie xoxo
