Alright, 45 minutes to whip this out. 3, 2, 1, GO.
First of all, this week the group split, our OE the one and only Mr. Robbie Frankle, took the lovely Anna away to Brookfield, a conservation park about four hours from the rest of the group. Two gone, six left to a different park called Deep Creek. Well, the six of us and Rick, the hilarious, dread locked Aussie straight out of Adelaide with years of experience under his belt and his head up in the clouds. “Quite the space cadet” Katelyn said one day, but what a great astronaut to have around. I miss him already.
The first day we woke up, Rick ushered us out of the house, drove us up to a ranger base and out we went, conserving the environment with “loppers” (basically giant garden sciossors, silly Aussies). Disclaimer: Sorry for incorrectly spelled words, I’m rushing and can’t find the much needed spell check button. Please bare with me.
We set out on the trail at eight in the morning and would return every day at four. And for those eight hours, our lives were filled with tedious branch cutting and flicking the flies out of our faces. Work fit for teenage deliquents that got caught shop lifting. But, as monotonous (sorry) as it was, I learned things. I grew as a person. I stopped, took a look around and breathed deeply. So what flies were crawling up my nose?
“Take a look at that view,” I would tell myself. And I would. The ocean was the bluest my eyes have ever witnessed, with the ocean sprawling outwards as far as my eyes could reach, getting lighter and lighter until it faded into the sky itself, making it look like the world was foldiong together infront of me. The mountains would split my vision in two, like Broadway curtains that slowly dragged back just as the show was starting. And as the natural play spun itself out, Rick would make a joke with Emily and all seven of us would laugh, and then cough as atleast two of us choked on a fly. So lesson learned, a whole week dedicated to trail maintenance can really get on your nerves, or, you can open your eyes past the work and onto the world infront of you.
Anyways, as a setup of what we did:
715- Wake up, eat some food and haul out of that haunted hostel we were staying at. I swear to you it was haunted. Cross my heart, what an eerie little cottage it was with old furniture stacked up and creepy pictures hanging from the walls. The lights would even flicker. Personally, I slept under the covers everynight.
800: Go meet the park rangers to recieve our task for the day. All days but one were trail maintenance, one day we had to pull staples out of fence posts and roll up the wired fence. Bea and I got about 8 feet away from a kangaroo that day.
100: Eat lunch onsite. We would always make lunches the night before. I now am a bit tired of peanut butter and jelly.
400: Head back to our haunted house.
400-1100: Hang out, laugh with Rick and the girls, watch a movie that we rented from the little convinience store down the road.
Alright. Five minutes left. Not bad, not bad. Now in Adelaide, I miss the smell of the freshly cut trees and the way that I would sneeze every other minute in the bush. Shout out to Rick, the hilarious Aussie guide who deserves a new bandana than the one he wore everyday. Even though we all wore the same clothes for seven days straight.
Cheers!
(Except to the demon in our hostel.)
Tera