Back in Adelaide for a couple of days now. There is probably no work till Tuesday and I didn’t feel like hanging around in that old farm house. It’s a fine place to sleep at but there’s not really anything else to do.
Work in the vintage is, as already mentioned, highly irregular. Right now all the big wineries have filled up their fermenters and don’t need any more grapes for the next days.
As I was hoping to do a lot of hours in the Valley this is a bit disappointing. On the other hand though I’m really glad to have time to refresh. Yesterday I worked from midnight till 6pm straight. The day before it was 13 hours so in total about 30 hours in two days with little sleep in between.
It certainly is tough but feasible because the work is not overly exhausting on the body or mind. I’m pretty sure it’ll become a bit easier over time when I’m more experienced and don’t have to concentrate that much any more.
From the feedback I got so far they’re happy with the work I’m doing. When I started driving the harvester Greg stayed with me for a couple of rows. Then he said “You’re a natural, you’ll be fine. I’ll have lunch in the ute”, leaving me on that $500.000 machine to do the work.
Yesterday night I caused some first damage as well leaving a scratch and some bend metal on the tractors. Nothing too serious and everybody told me that just happens but I still wasn’t very happy with it. I just don’t like doing stupid mistakes.