Marama Farm

I know it's been a while since I've updated this, but here is what I'm up to. I arrived in Christchurch back on the 15th and found out that I was going to be staying at the YMCA. I finally had my own room. I even had a great balcony that looked out over the city. It was a little rainy out so my friend Megan and I made a few road trips to find the sun. I did find it, but it wasn't as warm as we were hoping. I spent about 5 days in Christchurch sleeping on floors and going out at night with friends. Every couple days a new wave of people came off the ice and it was exciting to see everyone again.

At first I thought WWOOFing was going to be easy. I emailed a couple places but didn't get a response. Then I realized finding a farm was going to be a challenge so I emailed 7-8 places. The next day I had a farm lined up and everything was good. I arranged a couch to surf on in Timaru for the night before and was going to hitch down. Well, the next day that farm fell through but another person offered me a place. I tried calling them a few times but was unable to talk to the person in charge. Finally the next day I had an email indicating that the second farm had fallen through. I was not having a lucky go of this. I emailed another 7-10 farms the next day hoping one of them may come through. On Tuesday I received an email from Graham Clarke indicating hew as interested in my Antarctic travels but that he already had 3 WWOOFers. By that night, he had emailed me telling me to come anyway. The next morning I caught the bus out of town at 6:30 and thumbed my way down to Waipahi. By bus this would have taken 9 hours but with my good old trusty thumb it only took 8.5hrs. I had a little trouble getting through Dunedin but a very nice guy saw me and gave me a ride out of town where I was quickly picked up. The longest I waited for a ride (besides my walk through Dunedin) was about 15 min. I also managed to do this huge trek with only 4 rides.

So now I am on my WWOOFing adventure. At the farm there was already a German couple and another American. They are hard workers and fun to be around. I was told there would be 4-6 hours of work a day but that has now turned into 8-14. I would complain, but the boss is now out of town, and I'll be headed out next week to the next farm. On the farm there is 6000 Ewes, 2000 Lambs, and a few cattle. Work includes mending fences, crutching sheep (wiping their bums), herding sheep, picking up dead sheep, and cooking meals.
We do have some fun moments like when Graham took us to the Moonshine festival. I tried moonshine hokey-poky ice cream and it was great. We also went to a little cafe one day for lunch. The farm hand (also named Graham) is from England and his family took us all fishing one night. I caught the only fish which was a flounder type fish. The funny part of it is that I caught it with my hands in a little pond next to the river.
Since Boss Graham is away this week, we invited Neighbor Graham and his family over for dinner. It was a great feed with a bunch of great people. The WWOOFers all chipped in some cash for the food.

I don't know where I'm headed to next, but I hope to find a farm somewhere on the West Coast of the South Island. I don't know exactly when I'm headed back to the States, but right now I'm thinking it will most likely be the middle of April. I don't have a summer job yet and still don't have a job lined up for the ice next year. All of this is starting to stress me out a little, but I'm sure in the end everything will work out. If anyone has any good ideas for me for summer work, please add it to the comments.