Want to stay? Go pick some strawberries!

On June 1st 2017, I made the decision of a lifetime. I hopped on a flight from London Heathrow, heading to Brisbane, Australia to be with my partner. She's an Aussie and we thought it better to be somewhere warm and sunny rather then always cold and wet!

My journey starts with a 417 Work Holiday Visa which is valid for 1 year. To gain a 2nd year on this visa - the Australian Government requires each individual to complete 88 days of rural work. Still filled with excitement - I signed up to work on a Strawberry Farm. How hard could it be? Below is an image of me taken around 7am on a cold morning - of course wearing my smile proudly!

At first, the fascination at the size of the farm, growing 4.5 million plants and extracting over 50 tonnes of strawberries a day was incredible! The fields just never ended!!

Around 150 pickers had signed up for this season - 80% of which were all Koreans. The days were almost 12 hours long and the picking was intense. I managed a top picking day of around 270kg. I was pretty proud of myself but this was nowhere near what the Koreans were picking (upwards of 450kg per day!). Atleast the strawberries looked delicious!

Initially I thought it was a great idea to make visitors contribute to the countries economy. After a week I had changed my mind. This work was intense, and without help from travellers, the farming industry in Australia would not survive. Local Aussies refuse to work for such rates and on farms and so the solution is necessary. I think maybe 88 days is a little too long but I gave it a go. I manage to survive for 2 months before the heat, and allergies took me down. I'm now back in Brisbane working, with a view to return to a different farm if necessary in the future. I am hoping to save enough money to get a Partner visa so fingers crossed!

I made a lot of friends from all over the globe during this time! This was also where I was introduced to steemit by @eoincurran to whom I'm grateful!

Thanks for reading!