Farm life.

We knew this day was coming and we thought let's just get it over and done with. Sven, a friend from flashpackers had lined us up to go to the farm that he was at, but didn't tell us where we were going nor did he tell us anything about the farm. He thought "it will be better this way" what on earth had we just signed ourselves up for??

Well... in hindsight maybe it was better we hadn't known where we were going because I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have gone. The farm is situated 800km west of Brisbane, which let me tell you folks...Is pretty much in the middle of nowhere! The nearest supermarket was a 3 hour drive away so you can't be forgetting anything important.

Our first week was spent at Weaona - the other 'property'. The reason it's in quotation marks is because it's not really a house as such. It's basically a mobile shack thing. The toilets and showers are in a separate tin shed. For our first week we burnt trees so we could feed the sheep. Oh lord. It was literally our worst nightmare. I've never experienced anything like it.

Once we returned back to the normal house things got slightly better. We learnt how to ride dirt bikes, drive tractors, use chainsaws, use a rifle. Even learnt how to sheer a sheep!! Shearing was a fun and interesting day to be apart of! We went mustering most days -mustering is basically rounding up sheep on dirt bikes and moving them to a different area of the 65,000 acre property.

Living a life that is so remote to the real world can take a toll on you. The only people you see are the people you live, eat, and sleep with and occasionally the shearers. It's a very different lifestyle to what I'm used to. But in all honesty I'm really happy we've done it. To actually experience the true Australia.

All was going well... We were 2 months into the work and becoming quite adjusted to the way of life out west. Then disaster stuck.

I was out doing a job out in the fields and had just finished and was on my way home when I lost control of the front end of the bike and ended up underneath the bike 5 meters where I had fallen. At first I hadn't realised quite what had happened so I got out from under the bike and tried to get up....OH CRAP. You know there's certainly something wrong when you go to stand and you can feel the bones moving where they shouldn't be.
Right. So I'm alone somewhere in a 65,000 acre property. I knew the guy on the tractor that was in the field would come my way but when...I wasn't sure. So what could I do....nothing. I had to sit and wait and be patient. Someone will come....eventually.

Roughly around 2/3 hours later I see a truck coming my way. I thought it was maybe it was Corn or Dean realising I was missing. But no they still hasn't realised I was missing and It was a French backpacker from a neighbouring property wh,o bless his soul came to my rescue and picked me up and put me in the truck and we drove home... But that took slightly longer because we were in 2nd gear all the way as that's all my leg would allow.

Anyway long story short an ambulance turned up 3 hours later that drove me to cunnamulla community hospital that was 2 hours away. Where I got X-rayed and they confirmed a spiral fracture (break in 2 places) to my tibia which is the big bone in the lower leg. That hospital couldn't deal with the severity of my fracture so told me to make my own way to a fracture clinic?!? Meanwhile my leg is castes up above my knee?? Righto docs.

So we drove 12 hours to Lorraine's (the little life saver she is) where she took over as mother hen and got me to the nearest hospital to hers which was 100X better than cunnamulla where Cornelia was made head nurse and left in charge to look after me!?

8 days after the accident and lots of polavas later...I was in the operating theatre getting a metal rod shoved down my bone to keep it all in place...how delightful.

This little mishap kinda ruined my families plans for when they came out...my bad. After 2 weeks with my family I made the decision to come back to the UK for a while to recover and have a roof over my head and then I can get a job and once I've got enough money I'll head back out.

So I came home and wallowed in self pity for a good week or 2 but when I got told I could walk again I thought. Right. This is it, time to get fit and functional again. But nothing's ever that straight forward...1 step forward 10 steps back. It didn't seem like I was making any progress whatsoever. But sure enough a few weeks later I was going on long walks and back to normality.

Hey ho. Hey ho. It's back to work I go....I got a job easily enough and it was only bar work so not a lot of walking but lots of hours spent on my feet. This was a test to see how far i could push myself. Which turned out to be a fair bit, and shift by shift my leg would get more used to the work load. My determination was at an all time high to get back to Australia so I kept on working and then went to the gym a few times to see what I could do. I managed a 5k on the cross trainer in 25 minutes. And boy was I proud of myself!!

This was when I decided to come back out. I'd already had enough of England - even though I'd only been back 7 weeks. It was too long considering had I not had the accident I wouldn't have been back till September at least! But upwards and onwards.

So after a 27 hour flight I'm back in Australia and I'm heading off to the farm tomorrow...wish me luck...