As I am in Australia on a Working Holiday Visa I needed to complete 88 days of regional work to be signed off for my second year visa, aka 88 days slave. Me and Lauren went to a well known lady in Cairns called Ezzy from ‘Adventure Cairns and beyond’. From what we know now, she was a con artist and received $200 cash from every single person she signed up to the farm. Promising us thousands of dollars, swimming pools, accommodation on the farm, half an hour drive to Byron and even a gym! The farm is even suing her as she also promised 700 spaces on this farm and many people were turned away upon arrival. As I love to complain I’ve tried to leave her bad reviews on her Facebook but she deletes them. If it wasn’t for Olly arguing our case to her, Shona going behind her back and contacting ‘Tabulam Backpackers’ accommodation we wouldn’t of got on this farm and have somewhere to stay! Anyways we all drove from Cairns to Tabulam which is about a 2 hour drive inland from Byron Bay, in the middle of know where to start work at Mountain Blue Farm! 3 girls belongings and a months load of food shopping the cars suspension wasn’t doing well and sparking along the road we managed to arrive at Tabulam Backpackers. At our hostel/campsite there were in total 100 people, some in cabins, others camping with power and some camping with no power! Considering the farm had about 700 workers it was lucky if anyone that we lived with was on our team at work.
We definitely had too much stuff..
Me Shona and Lauren were put in a girls dorm called Koala’s, while the boys were out in wallaby. The rooms were big but seriously slacking some modern touches, such as a mirror! Yes I brought a full length one and yes I made everyone pay me that wanted to use it. This is now where we call home.
So this is the Hostel, the first shipping container is the shop and the rest has 4 bunk beds and 8 people living inside.
We went to work and got our buckets and belts and were trained how to pick blueberries. It might seem simple but there are lots of things you need to look out for and do in order to earn money. I won’t bore you with detail but you pick your row you put them in your bucket then you sort and hand them in. Then to come home and have everyone ask “how many buckets did you do” which when you’ve had a rubbish day didn’t help matters but when you’ve done your PB you want to let everyone know! 20 Buckets was my PB.
Our landlords Brenton aka Big B and Rose. The most incredible and understanding people you will ever meet, they are amazing. Our hostel was by far the best hostel around, all thanks to these two. Not only did they let you run a tab up for the ice creams and cans from the shop but they helped me out massively when I had my surgery by lending me and Olly there car so I could get to the doctors. These two were all of our Australian parents for four months and made the whole experience much more enjoyable.
Shona on our first day, you can tell it’s our first day as she still looks like she enjoys life.
I am aware there are many damaged berries in this but this was 10 minutes before my tantrum, See picture below for tantrum
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said tantrum.
Some days it was 40degrees, other days you had a shit block and it was incredibly hard to keep motivated. As we were casual staff we could leave when ever we wanted.. which meant a full day was hard to do as soon as a driver was going home. I had tantrums, I gave up, I powered through and I also took naps in the car. It was hard to pick when you had no music, when my iPod died and I was on a row with someone I didn’t know or who was faster than me that meant 3-4 hours of not talking and staring at bushes.. not fun.
Not everything was bad, I had the best time since travelling on this farm and the sunsets I saw on this farm were some of the most beautiful I’ve ever seen.
This McDonald’s was an hour away on the nearest town and the only place to get free wifi! Life isn’t too bad when you aren’t on social media every day constantly looking at plastic fantastic celebs and peoples poached egg and avo. I mainly used this wifi to let the family know I was still alive, download more music or check if I had been paid.
This was Daves home made house. Unfortunately it did burn down before a party once, which saw everyone from the hostel try and put it out and help rebuild him a new home!
Nights were spent drinking around a fire listening to music.
Our first weekend trip to the nearest town resulted in us eating dominoes by the side of the road.
Lunch breaks spent sitting next to this in the sun wasn’t so bad!
But not topping up the factor 50 definitely wasn’t fun!!
Blueberry competitions how many could you fit in your mouth, I have 20 here.
How many boys does it take to siphon petrol out of Laurens broken car?
Or try how many times can you break down in one week? Shona topped it with 6 cars throughout the farm!
My 🐨roomies !!
and my second roomies, wallaby babies!
When you’re in the wifi hour, there is no distracting me from catching up on group chats and buzz-feed!
Gifts from my sister made recovery from my third surgery that much easier 🙌🏼 even if customs stole 6 packets of crisps!
Or the time Jakob drove from Cairns to Tabulam to come and see me. We all had a weekend to Byron, nearly died before this picture was taken and in Byron. Jakob brought back luck 😂 Moments before this picture was taken a brown snake decided to charge across the water and chase us up the bank which was not fun. A brown snake is the second deadliest snake in the world if you were wondering( picture of snake on animals post). The second time was in Andrews car on the way to Byron, when going round a bend on a hill the tyre decided to come off which meant if we were going any faster the car would have flipped and gone down the hill resulting in sudden death. Thankful a mechanic stopped to help us and put us up in his lovely house which had a cinema screen in it. It was a pretty good night to be fair! 
Sometimes the weather was pretty terrifying. This night lightening struck no further than 10 meters from us and I couldn’t hear out of one of my ears. Unfortunately a backpacker was hiking up Mt Warning the night before, which is near to us, and was struck by lightening and passed away. 
THIS IS A FREAKING HAIL STONE!!! IT WAS LIKE THE WORLD WAS ENDING!
But this was the same week our landlords had to go out of town and asked Olly to run the Backpackers and me to help out feeding all their dogs. Of course I’m going to want to go and help play with a puppy as I wasn’t able to work due to my resent surgery. Brenton and Rose kindly have us their car to get to the house and back and also go to the doctors to have my stitches taken out. That in which I am truly grateful as no one left on the farm had a working car! 
Brenton and Roses beautiful house.
Starting to feel like Christmas!
The beautiful nightmare I had to look after! As well as 4 other beautiful dogs!
Twins..
We finally wore the same outfit after 6 months of hanging round together!
When the farm got hungry or hungover and one person was going to town..
I am going to split farm life up into different sections as there is simply too much content to put it all together, Living for the weekend will the parties, creek days and so on.
This experience was by far the best time I’ve had in Australia. It was so much fun and you get to spend four months with the same people, living with them, working with them and partying with them. Not to mention all the animals I encountered on the farm, it was amazing (Next post is all the animals). You get to know people pretty well and don’t get me wrong cabin fever can settle in at times. There were times you’d be in a bad mood because of something stupid like there was no hot water left and you would come back into the room and maybe take it out on you roomies, not intentionally but it does happen when you are in such close proximity with alot of people. I mean there was one small incident where we had 8 girls in our room and another girl thought it was ok to leave her stuff in our room as she was camping and would come and wake us all up, slam the door, use the mirror.. what a great way to start a day of work with 8 pissed off girls?! A side from that I got on with everyone so well. I know its so cliche to say but honestly the friends I made on this farm I truly believe will be my friends for life. Yes we had to work sometimes but days off spent drinking down the river with 60 odd people all relaxing and enjoying what we had. The vibes on the farm was something I’ve never experienced before.
Me and Shona were close before but on the farm we got even closer and there is no doubt about it we annoyed each other a lot, like at parties when I tried to keep her alive but she wanted to be a Lone Wolf haha but at the end of it she was honestly the hardest goodbye. I love our friendship, she keeps me on my toes with all her opinions and views of the world but along side with teaching me so much about life and people and ways of thinking and I love that. I love she challenges my way of thinking because I honestly think I give people more of a chance if they are different to me or have different interests or lifestyles and I 100% got that from Shona, so if you’re reading this shon, you’re making me a better person and you should be proud of that, because I am one stubborn bitch!
Daisy, She lives so close to me back home and I cannot wait to see her again! When I first met Daisy I was scared of her, I am not going to lie. But somehow I feel I manged to get past her first layer she shows to the world very quickly and she was hilarious! She has such a kind and warm heart and I will never forget coming back from my third surgery in Aus and feeling a little bit shit, obviously not being at home with my family was getting to me but I came back to the Cabin and Daz had made my bed, put small presents and pillows all together so nicely on my bed and I was so thankful for having her as a friend. It was a tiny gesture but it meant so much to me. When ever I didn’t feel well Das was the first one to make sure I was alright and if I needed anything. Shes one of those girls that would drop anything for her friends and that is rare to find these days. Miss you Daisy!
Annie & Snoop, I left the farm with these two nutcases and I am so glad I did. They are mine and Olly’s children and act like little baby birds when ever we leave the room they are just waiting for us to come home or bring back food. I haven’t laughed so much in my life and they are always up for a good time! They are the type of people you want around you all the time, their laughs and personalities are infectious. I got the Home feeling with these girls, they are the type of girls that you wish you were friends with and when you are, they aren’t going anywhere any time soon! These girls I can honestly say became some of my best friends on the farm and I am honoured to have met such lovely and welcoming girls! I cant wait to reunited with them soon!
Beth, Matilda and Joanna, By far the funniest, chilled, wittyest beautiful girls I’ve met! Two sweeds and a Scot, who would have thought that would make such a good trio! From the day these girls moved into our camp I got on with them like a house on fire! They are so funny and have that feeling like you’ve known them forever. They are the type of girls that would never judge you and most the time its intimating to befriend a group of beautiful girls and think they wont judge you for pooing on a frog, but not these girls, they are more likely to congratulate you on such accomplishments. I really love these girls and I hope I see them again one day. Its crazy how close you can get with people in such a short time but it happens and I am so glad I met this crazy Trio!!
These past four months was also time I got to spend with Olly and really get to know him. He saw me at my worst, sweating, crying, hungover and just a down right mess but we also had the best time together. We learnt a lot about one another and saw that if we could be on a farm together for four months, we could definitely have a healthy relationship off the farm and back home. He was incredible to me on the farm. He pushed me at work, he made my life easier having someone I could count on and rely on which was a new thing for me and I did not like to take lightly to as I wanted to be a strong independent person now I was travelling. But he showed me I still can be, just letting him ‘in’ was hard for me but I am glad we went to the farm single and came away together. He was my absolute rock on the farm during my surgeries and cared for me like no one has ever done and it was a no brainer that I would fall head over heals in love with him really haha… He did follow me to the farm because he has been in love with me from day 1 but that’s a different matter haha. I’ve never felt like this with anyone and for the first time in many many years I feel like a normal person with him, I fully trust him and I’ve never been happier! I cannot wait for the next adventure travelling together!
