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VLOG – The way we live


Howdie!

As I got to spend the daytime hours of my new years eve alone I thought I’d give you guys a view of what kind of accomodation you get for $35 per week as well as some backpacker protips for those of you who are yearning for knowledge

If you are yearning for some tips I’ll make my rather short list down below;

1. Being a backpacker, it is good to save money. There will come a time when you will need to decide if you’re going to go shopping at Kathmandu or K-mart. We chose Kathmandu, not knowing about the quality nor prices at K-mart. Turns out K-mart was half price, if that.

2. Huntsman spiders are “harmless”, but huge by Swedish standards. I have chosen the rather careful approach to things with a few too many legs as it is easy to run into dangerous bugs and spiders if you live like we do, in a tent.

3. If you’re looking for manual work in NSW in December or February/March. Go to Orange and pick cherries (December) or Apples (February/March). The job is easy and if you know how to work your hands and follow instructions, you will get hired. If you need a place to stay – google ‘Hostel Orange NSW’ and you will find this place.

Arkstedt Out!

Spotify Song of the Day: Black Sabbath – Changes

 

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To plan or not to plan

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Hi!

It has come to my attention that we are no longer enjoying the year of 2013, but are instead sharing the brand new and unexplored 2014.

My new years eve was a rather quiet one as I decided not to join Felix and David in their adventure to Sydney and instead stay here in Orange for a quiet night with our hosts, Peter and Claire.

Being a “backpacker” if I can even call myself that means that you trade your normal life for a very special one that I believe it will be hard to relate to for a regular person with a home and a job, but I shall in this post try to do my best.

What happens when you strap on your backpack and follow the first track that may lead to a job is that you quickly get into quite weird environments and everything changes. You find yourself living not just nearby, but WITH people you would hardly even have spoken to in your normal environment, you remake your entire diet, your schedule, and in essence your entire way of thinking.

I have been away from home for over a month now, changing accommodation once a week until we found this place in Orange where we are going on three weeks this Saturday – living in a tent.

Basically what happens is that you get used to the fact that nothing is really permanent and changing your plans for the future may be quicker than making two minute noodles. Just yesterday we helped our hosts moving some horses and all of a sudden, both Felix and David decide that horses are their favorite things in the world and we should abandon everything and go woofing on a horse farm – or well, they both wanted to. I prefer things with engines to things with legs. These kinds of appifanies appear around twice a day and it’s hard to know which ones to follow and which ones not to.

My protip for backpacking would therefor be not to do what may seem the sensible thing beforehand – to plan everything in detail, but instead to have a general idea of what you want to do and be prepared for as many other things as possible instead. You may just get stuck in a vineyard in rural Australia instead of chilling with your surfboard on the east coast.

That’ll be enough advice for a while now I think.

Spotify Song of the Day: Darius Rucker – Alright

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VLOG – Morning hunt


Good morning!

Today is my third day of hunting the rabbits at the vineyard and I thought I’d share the experience of going up early and sitting in the perfect spot as the sun is rising, watching and waiting.

There’s really not alot much else going on – as it is saturday today, we’re thinking of maybe going to “the lake” which is apparently the place to be on hot days, or taking a drive up “the mountain” which is the other spot in the vicinity that could pass as an adventurous place.

If it’s interesting enough, I may film some of it and upload it here. Stay tuned and stay safe!

Spotify Song of the Day: The St. Louis Ocarina Trio – The Dragonborn Comes

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Evening Ride


Good evening!

Today has been a good day! Firstly, the rain is gone and it has been a hot and enjoyable day. We spent some woofing hours taking rubbish and scrap metal to the tip and then spent another couple of hours hunting rabbits. We will not need to go shopping for meat this weekend they way things are now, and hopefully there will be another hunting session tomorrow morning (around 5 AM)

This video is completely unedited and features an evening ride from Nashdale and inwards on the country road (unsure of the name at the moment, but leave a comment if you’re curious).

There is probably alot of wind noise, so just lower the volume and put on some groovy music and enjoy the ride.

That’ll be all for today! Good night!

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Adventure Ride


Hi there guys!

Finally I have managed to upload my motorcycle videos. This one is from our stay in Katoomba in the Blue Mountains, where I was suggested to take a trip to a town called Oberon. The interesting thing though is that somewhere on the way my fuel light came on and there was pretty much nothing much like civilization nearby.

Might be entertaining! Another video will be live on the site any minute!

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Swedish fancy fencing


Good evening!

Christmas has come and in Australia it is celebrated a bit differently from the way we do it in Sweden. We started our day with some table tennis in the shed next to our tent, then went on to do some serious fencing for the vinyard where we live.

Our christmas eve was topped of with the swedish national dish; Tacos. To go with that we just happened to run in to some Swedish Rekordelig Strawberry Cider, that tasted exactly like midsummer.

I believe the video says it all, so I’m going to leave you with that until further notice.

Take care!

Spotify Song of the Day: John Mellencamp – Jack & Diane

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The picking of the cherries

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Good morning!

It is now day something of our stay in Orange, NSW and we seem to have settled down well enough. It’s not that hard to get used to sleeping in a tent as long as it is bug-proof and you have a proper airbed (which we do).

What’s happened in the last few days is the following:

1. We’ve gotten bored with picking cherries as it is about the dullest job you can have, and if you are inexperienced the pay is terrible (around 12 AUD per hour)

2. The car has been to a proper mechanic who passed it for next years rego, which is nice as the K-mart mechanics in Katoomba decided any cosmetic damage (of which there was alot) made it unsafe to drive on the road.

3. We’ve changed cherry farm, which unfortunately means that we have no work today. Although as our accomodation for this week is free, we’re quite satisfied anyway.

4. The tension of living so close to other people takes it’s toll on my mood and so last night i realised the best cure for a bad mood is an evening bike ride. The result of which will be published sometime soon, I hope.

That’ll be all for now. In 1348 minutes, my bike riding video will be uploaded and I can make a new post.

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Orange, NSW

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Surrounded by the greeting committee
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The surrounding landscape

Good news everyone!

After three days of job searching, we got a reply saying we were welcome to come work at a cherry picking farm in Orange, New South Wales – about two hours away from Katoomba. We left immediately and spent the first night in some kind of car park motel. While the city is nice enough, when we arrived mid day there was (and still is) a deafening sound from the chicadas in every tree, everywhere as soon as it gets the least bit hot outside.

After the night in the motel, we packed up our stuff and went to the cherry picking place and started working. After a quick search online, I found the only “hostel” in town, which was on a facebook page that had only a phone number and an address. I called and was told that the hostel was full, but if we had a tent, we were welcome to stay on the premises and still use the facilities, so we figured we should at least go check it out. $35 per week seemed too good to say no to.

Said and done, we arrived after some issues with the navigation as the address was not available on the GPS, but it would soon prove to be the best thing we’d done since arriving in Sydney.

The greeting committee consisted of four ultra cuddly, happy puppies so we sat with them in the sun for a while before we were shown where to pitch our tent.

So far, the first few days here have been awesome, the host family is the friendliest you can imagine, we have access to kitchen, toilet, showers, a huge garage, tools and we live pretty much in the middle of a fantastic vineyard.

The plan for today is to find and buy what I call an Australia-hat and finish digging a hole for one of the vineyard posts.

I think that’s all for now. Stay tuned!

Spotify Song of the Day: Nordman – Nu lever sommaren

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Behind the Scenes

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Good afternoon!

Today, we decided to take a morning walk to the Minni Ha-ha waterfall, which according to the information board at the hostel is located 2 kilometres from the hostel. This however was wrong, and the walk turned out to be around 5 kilometres to the waterfall and then obviously the same distance back. What disappointed me however is that everywhere else we’ve been walking, there has been awesome rainforest trails with a bunch of pretty sights, but on the way to Minni Ha-ha we walked on roads and sidewalks and it was.. not very entertaining.

When on site, the trail to the waterfall was absolutely great, with cool cliffs, big drops and steep stairs and to get to the little lagoon, you walk through a bunch of bushes. On the trail we ran into a bunch of people with camera equipment (far superior to my GoPro) who were apparently recording a tap dance session for So You Think You Can Dance (as seen in the picture above). All in all, it was a good workout.

If you’re in Katoomba and can spare the time, you should definitely pay the Minni Ha-ha’s a visit, but don’t walk there. Go by bus, car or bike, or the boots you wear for the hike down will be very hot.

Spotify Song of the Day: Monty Python – Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life