TripRoundUnder

Although our time on the farm in the beautiful Chapman Valley has ended, I thought I would do a post to recap on our more than eventful time!

So, we originally came to the farm to farm sit while the farmer, Dan was away seeding his wheat crop. He offered us free accommodation in a granny flat and we were instantly sold when we were greeted by 3 dogs wanting to say hello!

Steve immediately was thrown in the deep end, being tasked with towing some farm equipment 2 hours inland to the wheat fields and Lauren settled into her new position at the Geraldton Regional Hospital, quickly realising that it was going to be an “interesting” experience…

Life, farm sitting while Dan was away was pretty non eventful, as the farm only consisted of 100 acres of sheep and horses and they didn’t cause much trouble (yet). We spent some lovely evenings sitting by the fire watching the beautiful setting sun over the hills of the valley and loved becoming great friends with the dogs, especially Jack. Steve also got to work on setting up an electric fence for the dogs as they weren’t adverse to saying hello to the sheep!

Once Dan arrived back on the farm, we got into the groove of Lauren working most days at the hospital and Steve doing what he can around the farm and looking for work/online education. He ended up completing a university micro credential in data science and even got a job working on Election Day. This was an experience in itself, driving around on Election Day trying to find the right polling location!

We were pretty lucky that the farm was not that far away from some very special locations along the coast and although Lauren was working full time, we still managed to get away from the farm and spent some time exploring! One of these locations was Little Bay, near the small fishing town of Horrocks and we loved getting out and spending the day either diving around the coral reef, climbing the nearby sand dunes or relaxing by the beach. Steve even managed to snag a decent size crayfish while out diving and it tasted awesome grilled on the fire!

We were also given the opportunity to help out with sheep shearing! Dan has about 200 head of sheep all needing a haircut and we “volunteered” as shearing shed hands. This involved encouraging the sheep across the road and into the shearing shed yards and then helping with drafting off sheep and the wool collection process. Lauren became pretty handy at throwing wool fleeces and Steve’s complicated relationship with sheep developed, as he had to wrestle a few into their appropriate places.

Things became a little more stressful when one afternoon, farmer Dan came home in pain and ended up needing Steve to rush him to the hospital! A wild drive and a hospital admission later, he was diagnosed with pancreatitis and ended up getting flown down to Perth. This meant we were back into farm managing mode, however, the farm animals decided they weren’t going to be so well behaved this time. The sheep came to the conclusion that they did not want to stay in their assigned paddock and sheep dogs Lauren and Steve had their work cutout to stop them running on the road!

To make things worse, the dogs decided that they were hungry for the newly purchased chooks and Steve walked out to Jack and Boof each with a chicken in their mouths… not a nice find.

With Dan in recovery and on the mend, it was time for us to leave the farm and continue our adventure North! It was quite sad saying goodbye to our doggy friends and farmer Dan, but overall we loved this unique experience and we are very thankful that farmer Dan let us into his life and trusted us to look after his pride and joy. (Minus the sheep)