Week 1 of Fruit Picking

Time flies when you're working hard!

Our first week of fruit picking has begun and ended, it's twice as hard as we anticipated but also twice as fun. I have eaten my body weight in apricots and nectarines with the odd plum thrown in just for kicks. Up and down ladders with up to 20kg of fruit hanging in a bag from your shoulders from 7:30 til 5:00 isn't the easiest way to make a living, but the pay is good and the fruit is delicious. Not to mention a nice long lunch break and 2 tea breaks a day, where tea and biscuits are personally delivered by Simon the owner. Everyone at the orchard is really friendly, Lauren and I have been enjoying getting to know some of the regular workers including a few Vanuatans who come to New Zealand for half the year, earning in a week what would take them a year to earn at home.

We have both had a few near misses up the ladders, both nearly falling from over 10 feet up, admittedly mine was slightly more spectacular than Laurens as all of a sudden I was dangling from one hand with an apricot in the other and no ladder to be seen. I climbed down the tree hoping no-one had seen my misfortune but the laughter made it clear that wasn't the case. Lauren luckily managed to keep control of her ladder thus avoiding embarrassment. We learnt from our mistakes very quickly.

We went to the racecourse a few kilometres down the road to watch some racing, it was different to the racing we get in the UK. The jockeys were in chariots behind the horses, it's probably just as well as a few of them looked a little out of shape. The weather was hot and has been hot and without rain for some time with temperatures all week around the low 30's, to cool down we took a dip in Lake Dunstan five minutes drive from the orchard, the first time we have swum in NZ without a wetsuit. On Wednesday night however the heaven's opened and it rained for 18 hours solid dropping over 2 inches of rain, needless to say that work on Thursday was rained off, we took the opportunity to do a bit of shopping in the nearby town of Alexandra. Back to work for another hot Friday and Saturday.

In all it seems that fruit picking agrees with us, working outside in nice weather, days off when it rains, and a private reservoir on site, to do a few lengths after work to cool down (which is a hell of a lot warmer than the sea). Much too Laurens delight there is a resident Basset Hound called NATO who seems too like her very much, I think it's the biscuits she sneaks him during tea breaks!

This morning we awoke to snow capped peaks all around, yes snow in the middle of summer! It didn't reach us down in the valley but makes for quite a spectacular view. Today is Sunday and we are in Queenstown for, you guessed it, more shopping, a movie, and who knows maybe even a spot of bungee jumping. Then it's back to work for another week.

We'll try not to enjoy ourselves too much!

Speak to you soon!
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