Today I got up at 10:00 am and enjoyed some free pancakes from the hostel. Then Felix and I decided to visit the nearby national parcs.

So we started at 11 o’clock and arrived in the Girraween National Park at 12 o’clock. 🙂 We started our first track to the Dr Roberts Waterhole and the Underground Creek (round about 3 km).

At the Underground Creek we climbed the rocks and found a really good spot to have lunch and have a rest. 🙂 I decided to jump into the water. 🙂  :/ See the video 😛

The view was amazing and we had a really good time up on the rocks.

Then we returned to the car and decided to drive to the Sundown National Park. 🙂 First of all we filled the tank of the car and bought something to eat for dinner. 🙂

We had to ask for the way, twice, and some nice Australian citizens told us the right way. 🙂 So we arrived at the Sundown National Park at 4:00 pm.

 There was only one problem… we weren’t allowed to go by car (Station Wagon) to the red rock which we wanted to see. Nevertheless we tried but failed ( the way was too rocky) :/

So we parked the car, had dinner on the roof of the car, repaired and prepared some stuff for the car and finally started at 5 o’clock our trip to the „Red Rock“.

It was such an amazing scenery all along the way, and so it wasn’t too bad, that we didn’t walk all the 7 km to see the Red Rock. We stopped after 5 km, because we realized that it would be dark soon, and we had to return. 🙂

On our way back to the hostel we saw snakes, foxes, kangaroos, and deer.  Luckily we didn’t crash into any of them, and finally we got back to our hostel, healthy and lucky. 🙂 Tomorrow I will have to work at 5:40,  so I went to bed after I had prepared my lunch for the next day.

This morning I got up at 4:30 am because I thought to have a job for today. ( again picking peppers). During the night it had rained a lot and so the ground was really wet this morning… farmer called: No work for today. 🙁 So I went back to my bed and tried to fall asleep. At 9:00 o’clock my German roommate came in and said that both of us was offered a job for today. 🙂 🙂 That made me really happy and we decided to prepare for it. At 10:10 am we left the hostel and went to the Alpine Lodge (Luxury Countryside Lodges). The owners are two really nice people (Margareth and Michael) who showed us what to do. 🙂 First of all we had to dig holes around some trees and had to put straw into it to make sure, that the trees stay moist during the heat periods in Stanthorpe. We did this for one and a half hour ( really huge garden) 🙂

Our next job was to mow the lawn, all over the place. 🙂 While one did this, the other used an edge-cutter to cut the edges of the lawn around the cottages. 🙂

After 2 hours this work was done, too. So our next job was to pull out some dried trees of the ground. Really hard work because we had to lift them on a pick-up afterwards (good workout) :).

At half past one we had lunch. I prepared some pancakes with meat and vegetables. Alex forgot to take something for lunch, so I gave him half of my pancake. :)Then we had to trim some hedges. I did it first, then it was Alex’s turn. Alex is my 27 years-old German roommate.  It was his first time to hedge, but he did really fine. 🙂

After that we started to remove some stones from the ground because the couple wanted to renew them. 🙂 In the end we had worked for six and a half hours, it was good work, and we returned luckily to our hostel. Margareth and Michael gave us a lift in their Mercedes C300 AMG) :). Back at the hostel we started to prepare for tonight’s party in the hostel. (Tomorrow is Australia Day ) 🙂

Yesterday I got a call from the lady of the work-agency in Stanthorpe and I got the information that there is a job available in the Summit Backpackers (Working-Hostel in Stanthorpe). So I decided to call there. I got a bed in the hostel and packed all my stuff within half an hour. They picked me up at 5 pm and I enjoyed a free barbecue as a welcome gift at the hostel.

The best thing is I got the job on a capsicum farm today. So I woke up at 5:00 o’clock and caught the bus to work. It was a hard and rough work because capsicums grow on the ground and so you have to be bent forward all the time ( 8 hours). :/ When you pick capsicums you have to be careful that you only pick the red (ripe) ones and that you are fast ( it’s hourly paid but, of course, the farmer wants to see us work fast ) So I did and filled my bucket. I worked together with 5 other guys ( 4 French and 1 German) . Everybody had his own row and had to pick on both sides of the row.  This time the supervisor was a girl (farmer’s daughter). Whenever one of us had a full bucket he had to yell out “bucket” , then everybody had to stop picking and had to carry the bucket to the tractor. On the tractor there are a few bins where the capsicums have to be tossed in.

the bus to work

the tractor

me picking a pepper^^

I have got a pain all over in my back but still, the farmer is really nice and I got work till Saturday,   So I will earn enough money to pay the rent for the hostel.

finished for the day^^

This hostel is so much better than the caravan-park. I got a signal, so I can publish my blog more often, and they offer warm showers for free. A big kitchen, a small gym and the people here are really friendly. I live in a room with three other guys. (they are not very tidy ^^)

my bed ^^

the gym

All of them are from Germany. 🙁 But there are people from the UK here as well and I have already talked to them. They are really nice and they said that my English is very good. That made me very proud of myself. 🙂

Today I got up at 9 o’clock because I wanted to do a trip to the nearest national parc with some English friends from the caravan-parc. So we did. After a half- an- hour- drive we arrived at the national parc.

There were several tracks to take but we decided to go to Southern Rocks. It was a real hike (3,5 km) and we had to pause several times. After we had arrived at the first rock, we climbed up all to the top of it and took some amazing pictures. It was really funny to climb all these rocks and to challenge myself to jump over big gaps and enjoy an amazing scenery. Once I almost tripped after a huge jump from one rock to another, but luckily I didn’t fall.

After that we went to The Sphinx – which is called Sphinx because it is said to look exactly as the one in Egypt – with a lot of imagination I could see it too). 🙂 We had a lot of fun there as well.

After that only Jayson and I went to the Castle-Rock because the others were too exhausted. We jogged up the path to Castle-Rock and took a lot of photos there.

Then we returned all together to the car. They gave me a lift to Stanthorpe and I bought my groceries at IGA. Thanks for that amazing trip mates!!!!

Back at the caravan parc I spent another day without a job. The job at the winery had only been for three days. So I prepared lunch (pasta with pork, a lot of vegetables and tomato sauce. It was delicious 🙂

Today I got a job on a farm and had to get up at 6:00 o’clock. I didn’t know what kind of farmwork it would be but I found out really quickly that Jayson ( a nice guy from the UK who lives in a tent next to my bunk) and I would have to work on a winery farm (Ridgemill Estate).

the farm

me

my lunch

Our job was to put up nets over the grapes to protect them against birds. First of all we had to put up the nets on both sides of the rows and had to clip them to the bars. We grabbed each side of the net and clipped them together so that there was no gap between the grapes and the nets. We worked for 7 and a half hours, had a smoke-go and a lunch-break.

The farmer was really nice and allowed us to sit inside of his winery for lunch. 😀 The style of the winery was quite modern and one bottle of wine is not so expensive there but it i of good quality. 93 Points of 100 🙂

Tomorrow they will start pressing and the farmer said that I can have a look because I asked him a lot of questions about the process of making wine. 🙂

After work Jayson took me home (in his car). The winery is quite near to our caravan-park and the farmer said that there will be work for us for a couple of days. 🙂 So hopefully for one week. 🙂

Today Mick and I went down to the creek to do some fossil-digging. Mick is  an old Australian guy, who I met first yesterday and who offered to introduce me to the art of fossil-digging.

Mick

We brought all of the tools we needed: two different types of sieves, shovel, hammer and two bottles of water. When we had  arrived at the creek Mick spotted out the places, where we could try to dig for some fossils (crystals, diamonds, gold or topaz).

the equipment^^

The first step of fossil-digging is to dig a hole with the shovel next to a big rock and to put all the stuff from your shovel into the sieve. When the sieve is full, you use a special sort of technique to get rid of dirt and little stones. You hold the sieve into the water, until the stones are just covered with water. Then you move it gently from one side to the other, until the stones are lined up in the middle of your sieve. Then you turn your sieve and do the same procedure again, you repeat it for 6 times, then you’ll find the good stones separated from the rest exactly in the middle of the sieve, because they are lighter.

If you find something interesting, you have to hold it against the sun to check, whether it’s crystal or useless. We found some crystals but no gold nor diamonds. But normally, Mick said, he finds more. He is a very wise guy and knows a lot about the places, where you can find different kinds of stones. He told me, that, once upon the time, he was in New-Zealand

and there he found a lot. Nevertheless, I was pretty happy to have experienced some fossil-digging  (I would never try it in Germany but Queensland is known for its large amounts of crystals, diamonds and gold) and I am proud of my stones. Some aren’t crystals but I’ll keep them, because they look really beautiful.

Mick said, that I will have to get my crystals polished (it will take about 21 days).  Then I can use them as a keyholder or necklace. Let’s see where I will find someone, who can polish them for me on my trip around the world.

Today I woke up at 3:00 am because my flight was at 6:00 am from Cairns to Brisbane.:0 I was at the Airport by 4:00 am and had to wait for 2 hours on the airport. I watched movies. At 8:30 my aircraft landed in Brisbane. I got my luggage (16,8 kg) from the baggage claim and went to the Airtrain. I caught one right in time and arrived at 9:30 at Roma Street in Brisbane. I waited a couple of minutes for Yoshie because we wanted to meet the last time in Australia. When she arrived we were both very happy and spent a nice time together, drinking coffee and talking.  Then we went to the bus terminal together, where the Crisp Coach to Stanthorpe would arrive. (I’m going to Stanthorpe because I want to work on a farm again and will check in at a working hostel there). We just had to wait for 5 minutes and then we had to say goodbye. It was really hard, because I really like Yoshie, she’s a cute girl with a lovely smile and very good character.<3

( Hope to meet her again at another part of this world). Then I entered the bus 4 and started my (4-hours bus-trip) to Stanthorpe.

Arriving in Stanthorpe it reminded me of an old western movie. Everywhere men with cowboy-hats and signs for Rodeos on the weekends. 🙂 The caravan park was out of town so I already had to buy all my groceries here. 🙂 When I arrived at the caravan park with the caravan park shuttle, the lady showed me my bunk. 🙂 It is just perfect, my own room with a cupboard and a bed for 160 AUD weekly. For Australia that’s cheap.

So hopefully they will find work for me in the next week. I will talk to many people and see, whether I can manage to get a job by myself, but I think, so far out of town, it will be difficult. Difficult, too, is to get internet, so I am really sorry, guys, but I’m afraid you won’t hear so much from me as long as  I will stay in Stanthorpe.

The days between Christmas and New Years Eve I had stayed in the hostel just getting to know other people, eating, doing some work-out, curing my cough (getting healthy) and enjoying Cairns at day and at night. Here some pictures of Cairns. Have a look, guys. 🙂

On New Years Eve I went to the Ultimate Party in Cairns, had

great fun (dancing on top of the partybus) and at midnight I enjoyed the fireworks by the seaside. It was amazing.