Comrie Croft

So we are now staying at a place called Comrie Croft which is, you guessed it, near Comrie. That's just north a bit of Stirling and Edinburgh. Comrie Croft is a hostel/campground and they also rent bikes and have a tea garden. They usually have large groups come into the hostel so last week we had a Baptist Church group here and this week we have a German school group. Our accommodation is in large caravan that has a living room and everything so we have a lot of room to ourselves.

 This helpx job is a bit different as we are making all our own food and just get an allowance from Comrie Croft for food. We only have to work about four hours a day which leaves a tonne of time for us to do lots of our own things. Since they rent out lots of bikes we can take bikes out and cycle around the countryside anytime we want. They even have a tandem bicycle, which is something fun and different to go out on. 

One day we got a tip from Martin the maintenance guy that works here that there was a ginormous raspberry patch only a mile cycle ride away so we went and picked a few pounds of fresh wild raspberries, so good!

For work we are working on creating a new games room that will have a pool table and table tennis in it. So far we have moved all the rental bikes out of the room into their new places and disassembled the old bike racks. After that we sealed the walls so that the new paint will stick on the old mortar walls. I'm using all the handy man skills that my dad tried to teach me, but that I never quite paid enough attention too…. 

We've had lots of really sunny days for once which is really nice for biking and hiking around. One night had a fire and made some banana boats which made us feel like we were right at home camping in Algonquin. It's even been hot enough to go swimming, so i've taken a dip or two in the campground pond thingy. Ice cold! No chance of Sophie going in. Overall this helpx is quite a bit different because we keep more to ourselves and on our time off we can just go and do whatever we like so we spend a lot more time together and just have a lot of down time. 

From Farm To Croft

So today we said good bye to our hosts Jamie and Morag and our animal friends and headed off to Crieff to work for the next three weeks. We really enjoyed working at Barndromin farm. We learned a lot about farming and sheep, did lots of hiking in the highlands and just had tonnes of fun hanging out on the farm. 

Last Thursday we got a day off and went down to the coast to take a boat tour of the local area. Jamie generously paid for us in return for all the extra work we were doing and we got a great 2 hour tour of the coast. We went and saw the third largest whirlpool in the world and saw lots of wildlife including some seals and a minke whale! Topped the day off with some classic fish and chips in Oban and had a great day off. 

Jamie and Morag have been great and took us along to one of their many dinner parties that they have regularly with their friends. This party was at one of their friends' that live on an island which makes the party a bit more interesting. To get over you have to get to the ferry (first come first serve) and line up, the ferry can only take a few cars but they just squeeze them all on and once were over the ferryman kind of deploys the ramp and revs the engine to keep the ramp on the pier to prevent the ferry from drifting away while you drive off…..crazy Scots. Had a great dinner and met lots of their travelling friends. As soon as around 10:15 rolls around everyone jumps up and once and races a crossed the island to try and catch the last ferry back….needless to say if this was in Canada the Van Bergeyk family would always be stuck on the island. 

Yesterday on our last day at the farm Jamie, some friends and I got up at 6:30am and headed up to Glencoe to hike the anakeigan ridge. It was awesome! Bright sunny morning, a great view and a challenging ridge to climb, what more could I ask for? Apparently it was a grade 3 hike which means that it's the steepest kind of mountain climbing you can do without equipment. So fun. After we got back all of us went out in Jamie and Morag's boat for the afternoon. Did some mackerel fishing, I can honestly say that it's my new favourite kind of fishing. I put the line in for literally 5 seconds and had 5 fish on my line, amazing! Sophie caught a whole bunch too. 

We will be missing the farm life, feeding the chickens, shearing, crogging, driving the quad etc. But now we are making some new friends in Crieff. We're at a place called the Comrie Croft which has a hostel, tea garden, camp ground and bike track. They also rent bikes so Sophie and I can use them and bike around the country side for the next few weeks. Should be lots of fun, we only have to work four hours a day and get two days off. We also cook for ourselves and get a small allowance for food  so it's a bit different from our other jobs. As usual there is lots to do around the area and we will get to check out a new part of Scotland!

Nathan Crogging

For those of you who do not have Facebook, we thought we would post this video of Nathan crogging. This was only his second day, he has improved much since then!

A Week at a Glance

Well some of you might be wondering why it has been so long since our last blog. I could make excuses like we're too busy exploring and seeing the sights etc. But the truth is our host has an excellent book collection that just so happens to have some of my favourite genres...only two weeks left to read them all so...

Last weekend we went hiking with our hosts and some of their friends near Ben Nevis (the largest mountain in Britain) to the Ring of Steall. It was great because we hiked up a picturesque valley to this waterfall and the sun was shining and the mountains were all in the background, it was awesome. After a few hours we hiked to the top of first munro and had an spectacular view of Ben Nevis and the surrounding area. We were pretty tired, we had some lunch and then most people headed back to the vehicles while 4 of us wanted to do the whole ring, which includes 4 munros. So we headed off and it wasn't too bad because once your done the first one your higher and you can just follow the ridge line and you only have to hike up and down…..less. The best part was walking along the narrow parts of the ridge where it was a steep slope on both sides, you really feel like your mouton liming then! The worst  part was the way down on the last one because you have to descend like 3,000 feet and your knees feel like jelly by the time you reach the bottom. So that was on last friday. 

The rest of the weekend we headed off back to Edinburgh to help our hosts paint and fix up their flat that they rent out. Did some painting and some cleaning. Morag took us out for a nice italian dinner so that was very nice of her. Other than that this week has been pretty normal just doing some more shearing, I've got the technique down now so i'm not as sore anymore. 

On thursday we went to the Isle of Mull for the Tobermory Highland Games. Took the ferry and then the bus to a small but pretty town on the north part of the island. Experiencing the highland games was tonnes of fun, all kinds of cool events and strength contests. Highland dancing, pipers and foot races. Of course I had to participate in the open 440 yard foot race. Didn't win, but I did get a small consolation bottle of Tobermory whiskey haha. The set up was great because where all the events took place was beside a hill where everyone could just sit in the grass and watch the whole event. 

Yesterday we went and did some shearing at one of Jamie's neighbours' farms. Lots of hard work but he is going to pay us for the help that we gave him. Also our hosts have paid us some money already for all the extra help and work we have put in on the farm which is awesome and unexpected. Only a week and a half until we head off to our next job. But we will be really sad to leave the farm. I think we enjoy the farm life!

Barndromin Farm

We are finally settled again but this time on a beautiful sheep farm/B&B in Oban. This family, just like the last, has welcomed us with open arms and has so far made our stay very comfortable. It actually reminds me a lot of home, it is as though we have just joined the family and are carrying on with the family chores. Without these families or this entire HelpX experience I am not sure I would have made it this far without considering the option of going home. When Nate and I are living in scummy hostels and trying to find a place to eat our dinner that is not the side of the road it really makes me miss my bed and my family. But thankfully that is not the case most of the time (and yes I do realize that those scummy hostels and road side dining is our choice), we have been blessed with these people who took us in not having a clue who we were and gave us a bed and fed us and have so far treated us as more than strangers.
So for a change Nate and I are for the most part working separate most of the time. I tend to stay within the home and/or Bed and Breakfast changing over rooms, ironing, cooking and just general cleaning. While as Nate spends his days out in the fields tending to his flock.


Like Sophie has said things have been great here on the farm and we are enjoying our time here. I spend most of the time helping Jamie do a variety of things with the sheep like dosing, organizing them for culling and spraying them down for flies etc. Today we started sheering, my job is to basically wrestle the sheep out of the pen and toss them on their bums so he can grab them right away. It's tough! Especially as the beginning when I didn't have clue what I was doing. Now I have the technique down though and it's a bit easier but wow I will be sore tomorrow! I usually just work all day with Jamie so in compensation for all the extra work we are doing our hosts are going to pay for a trip to the Isle of Mull for us, which is fantastic.

On Sunday we had a day off and went with our host to hike up a munro to see some rare flowers (He is  quite the flower enthusiast). A munro is anything over 3,000 feet in Scotland.....I said to myself 3,000 feet can't be that high. Big Mistake! So we headed off on this day trip with our bikes, first we biked 6km to the mountain and then hiked all the way up it. Brutal, my legs were trembling on the way down to say the least. Lots of fun and Sophie is basically a mountain girl now.




Didn't have an amazing view cause we were in the clouds but still some great scenery and a great experience! Definitely the highest mountain I've ever climbed. Tomorrow we will be out shearing again (my poor arms!) and then on Thursday we will probably be taking our trip to the Isle of Mull, our hosts our farmers so we don't really work around the weekend but more the weather. Lots of fun and learning  tonnes!

Highland Fling - Day 4/5

Day 4

Headed out to see Loch Ness first thing today. Lots of people took a boat cruise on the Loch last night to find Nessie and see the lake. Call me an unbeliever but I didn't want to spend the 12 pounds to tour a lake. This morning we stopped and did the "Nessie Haka". Which is basically a dance our guide made up to summon Nessie from the lake, based on the New Zealand Haka of course! We all had fun trying to summon Nessie from the lake. Afterward I climbed up the Nessie model and almost knocked the neck/head from the giant Nessie….ops. 

Next we went to the site of the Battle of Culloden which took place in 1746 the Jacobites versus the Red Coats. Long story short some of the highlanders wanted the old scottish king back on the throne and led by their candidate almost reached London to overthrow the current king. Initially they were quite successful but in this battle their were essentially slaughtered. After this battle the English began doing the "Highland Clearances", this cleared a lot of Highlanders off their land and resulted in many Scots migrating to places like Canada. The battlefield was very sobering, but very well laid out with flags denoting the locations of both forces so you could imagine what it was like for the highlanders to charge the redcoats. After the battle the English behaved badly and would let no one bury the dead. They also went about the countryside killing anyone who they thought was a jacobite and burning all kinds of houses. Our guide says that the British army will come and visit the battlefield to teach soldiers how not to behave after a battle which I would quite interesting. 

After the battlefield we headed off to see some old burial mounds that are well over 3000 years old. Very interesting because there are all these standing stones and then these big piles of stones with a little path in the middle. Apparently the standing stones used in the structure were quarried miles away, so they would have had to carry or drag the stones miles because the wheel hadn't been invented yet! 

Then we headed off to see this odd well. Sophie calls it the creepy well and I tend to agree with her, it's really called the cloth well though. Apparently people believe that the well has healing properties and that if they take a piece of clothing of a relative or sick person and tie it to a tree nearby the well their relative will be healed. At first I thought it was stupid, but then I just felt sad for people that believe that this spring of water can heal their loved ones…..

Our tour then headed off for a whiskey distillery tour! I wouldn't mind learning how whiskey is made, but I didn't want to pay the eight pounds for the tour. So our great bus driver Don drove us to the local town where me and Sophie just walked around and saw an old abbey which was pretty cool in itself. 

Went back to the same hostel we were at the night before and cooked up so yummy fajitas in the kitchen, it was nice to have a self cooked meal again. At the pub that night we had some live entertainment, a one man band who played the harmonica, guitar and had a foot drum and foot tambourine. He was pretty good and would play any song requested!

Day 5

Now we're headed back to Edinburgh! Mixed feelings as we are looking forward to the sheep farm but also going to miss our new friends we made on our tour. First stop we made on the way back was to a Commando monument which commemorates all the commandos who trained and lost their lives in WWII. The area we were in is where all the commandos did their training. The commandos were raised in 1940 when the war was at it's lowest for England. The best men from British regiments were taken and given special training to conduct extremely dangerous and important missions. They served everywhere from North Africa to mainland Europe and over 1700 commandos died during the War. 

The other neat thing we saw on the way back to Edinburgh was a Cathedral in Dunkeld. Nothing to special just an old cathedral but inside were these white haired elderly ladies who are bell soloists! They just play hand bells to old hymns like 'How Great Thou Art', they were great. They do it to raise money to completely restore the old church. The other cool thing they had in the church were old colours that had been taken into battle by British soldiers in the Crimean War and Northern India rebellions and looked super old and battle worn. So awesome! 

That was our last stop for the day, after which we drove to Edinburgh and said good bye to some new friends and our bus driver Don. Now we are back to hosteling until tomorrow!

Isle Of Skye - Day 3

Today we woke up on the Isle of Skye after a night of watching a beautiful sunset over the island and watching Italy get ruined in the euro cup. Also spoke to some of our fellow travellers and got some advice about where to go in Italy and all their adventures. It's really neat talking to all the different people on our bus, where they've been what they've been doing or where they are going to go. The one fellow on our tour is part time in the Australian Air Force, Infantry trained and has done a tour in Iraq so it's been interesting talking to him and others on our tour. 

It's hard to keep track of everything we do in a day because you just see so many castles and hills and monuments but I will try and remember accurately all the names and places we went to. First off we headed to a place with glorious view of the surrounding hills and our guide told us a story about faeries and after the story we all had to dip our faces in the river so that the faeries could make us even more good looking then we already were, so that really woke us up! 

After that we headed north to the Old Man of Storr, which was just a large hill with some interesting rocks at the top that gave us an amazing view of the mainland and surrounding hill. You could literally just sit there all day and appreciate the view! It was quite the climb and our guide says he has only gone to the top twice with other groups. It was cool seeing all the sheep in the hills around us and they just climb around no problem. 

Then we headed off, exhausted to some cliffs and other look outs, all gorgeous and giving us just great views. We stopped at an old 2000 year old ruin that some old vikings had built and that archaeologists can only guess at what it use to look like. It's neat just walking through their rock ruins imagining what it was like over 2000 years ago.

After we finished there we headed off to Fort Augustus near Loch Ness, where we are staying to the next two nights as we travel the surrounding area. These hostels have been great because they actually have kitchens with pots/pans etc. where we can cook our own meals at night, which cuts down on a lot of cost as don't have to go out every night. Tonight we bought stuffed crust pizza from the grocery store! So cool! You can buy stuffed crust pizza here it's awesome. They also have lots of quick meals that aren't make of crap and that don't have lots of preservatives in them so those have been great too. 

Tomorrow we will be off touring around loch ness and inverness which will be lots of fun. Super exhausted from that big hike up the Old Man of Storr though. The Isle of Skye kind of reminded me and Sophie of the West coast meets the East coast of Canada because of the fishing villages and all the mountains nearby. Anyways lots of fun ahead, Cheers!