leaving Ross River finally!

Where to start…well it has been an amazing four months since I last updated you. I have settled very nicely into Ross River, turning it into my home away from home! I have done many things since I have been here, from cleaning toilets after the festival to throwing a cow tail at the Harts Range Rodeo the other weekend..and yes you did just read that right I throw a REAL cow tail and I was up there with the winners, I didn’t win unfortunately but it was still a bit of a chuckle. 

I now only have less than a week left here before I head off further out bush to work in a camp kitchen for this Art group that came to Ross River. I will be living in a place called Tempe Downs and sleeping in a swag for a month. Should be interesting. But the good news is that I will actually be getting paid! Seems like forever since I last had money going into my bank account.And this is where i will be living:

 As my lovely friend Judith mentioned to me it is only 62 days until I come home now, this time in 2 months I shall be landing back in Gatwick (or is it Heathrow…will have to double check that one) and back to the lovely cold weather of the English winter.
Even though it has been winter here for the last 2 months I have still been having better weather then England (sometimes it matches your weather with lows of about 12) with temperatures of about 20/30 during the day, it has been great this last week I have even been able to top up the tan and be in shorts and tshirts again. However the night time is when we have felt the freezing temperatures of winter, with temps dropping down as low as -5 some mornings, so don’t worry I do still know what the cold feels like. 

So what have I actually been doing in these last 4 months I hear you say…I started off as just a general busy body helping out with general maintenance and cleaning cabins, and then for a month I became a governess (home tutor type of thing) which was very interesting as Ziggy (the 8 year old I was teaching) had become very fond of me, causing some days to be very awkward. But we got through it without killing each other. After this I went back to cleaning cabins, and was originally meant to be leaving on the 12^th of July, after my 21^st birthday, which was just amazing. Everyone here made such an effort to make it special for me and we had an ‘M’ themed party. They all used their imaginations, and we had costumes ranging from a mime, to mincemeat man…yes…that’s right Cathal strapped two packets of minced meat to himself. Now I was actually all ready to leave Ross River this time and I had accepted the fact that I would have to leave, when suddenly I was given a job offer to go out to Tempe Downs and work in a camp kitchen (as mentioned above) this would mean that I would have to spend another month at Ross River, it didn’t take me long to accept that offer and change my train ticket for a 4^th time. So for the last month my job has mainly been painting all the cabins I think I am up to something like 16 cabins painted at the moment, with only 3 left to go, so really haven’t done a bad job there. Apart from the job side of life (if you can really call it the job side of life out here) I have been doing a few different things, I have been on 2 more helicopter rides, been to a 3 day festival, few not to memorable nights in town J, and just general parties for people leaving and birthdays. I really have made this place home and I will be sad to leave here, but it is good to have the knowledge that I am coming back here next year for another couple of months, don’t think I could ever stay away from here for too long, Shane, Jodie, the kids, Graham, Lee, Cathal and the rest of the gang have really made it so I have had the time of my life here, and I love them all for it.
But now, it is time to get on the road again and see what else is out there.