Most work and holiday visas for other countries are only valid for one year, but Australia is one of the very few countries where it’s possible to apply for a second working holiday visa for one additional year. However- you need to complete 88 days of regional work in Australia during your first WTH-visa. I think that the scheme was mostly created to help farmers in the more rural parts to find temporary worker and we’re just a few days away from completing our 88 days!
It feels almost impossible to summary our experience here and it feels that we have been here forever. This has been our first home in Australia and our first experience of the real Australia. I’ve seen more deadly snakes than I can count, drove a car whose breaks doesn’t really work, getting used to the complete silence around here and have gotten to know 10 000 macadamia trees. We have been here to replace the entire watering system around their two farms, but we have also built a chicken cage, extinguished a bushfire, looked after pigs and realized that it’s possible to survive a full day without my phone (poor network coverage). We have done several roadtrips to Rainbow Beach/Inskip, Hervey Bay, Noosa and Mooloolaba.
It’s been a rollercoaster, but it has mostly been a very good experience and I feel lucky to have seen this part of Australia. There’s a lot of Australians out there that haven’t really experienced the rural parts of Australia.
Our first plan was to leave the farm as soon as we had completed our 88 days, but it didn’t work out that way. It has been a lot of delays and we haven’t even started putting up the new pipes around the orchard, so our second plan was to stay around for a few more weeks to complete it which will take us up to the end on Nov/beginning of December. The problem with that is the both me and V will struggle to find work in the city during December, since our industries doesn’t really hire any new before January. So our third (and last) plan is to go to Bali in December for a full month! It will actually turn out cheaper than paying for a expensive hostel in Australia during the same period and our money will last a lot longer in Bali. So we figured, why not? We’ll stay at the farm for another 5 weeks before flying off to Bali in the beginning of December.