Week 3 - Duck Reach Point

This week we worked at Duck Reach Point which is a greenland reserve linked to Cataract Gorge. The project involved building a track, and the first thing we had to do was decide where it was going to go. The problem was that the area was steep and covered in trees, so monday was basically spent marking out the track by placing yellow tape on the trees. The entire length of the walkway was going to be about 4 km and would eventually take about one and a half hours to walk, so you can imagine how tiring it would be to be building the track in 30 degree temperatures. After a decent route had been marked out we sat down for lunch beside an old car wreck. Everything had been stripped out of the car, and most of it looked burnt anyway, but we all jumped at the chance to sit inside it. We didn't look too cool though. Oh and we also came across a bee swarm, but it wasn't that interesting.

On Tuesday we began clearing the track using brush strimmers to cut the grass, while Tom was in charge of getting rid of trees. The welsh boy had a chainsaw license and he was good at taking trees down, aswell as climbing up them. There really isn't a better noise than hearing a tree fall down though. Me, Jan and Kim (a Korean a.k.a. Harry Tosis) took care of brush strimming, which is fun until the cutting wire runs out. Once we had finished our day's work we needed to get back up a hill, which our team leader Jim had driven down earlier that day. Its very steep, has a couple of turns, and it didn't help that we were in a manual van with Carlos inside and a trailer attached. We didn't get up on the first try and ended up slipping a little so we started from the bottom again. This time Jim made it, but it was thrilling nonetheless, especially considering that he nearly burnt out the clutch in 1st.

The rest of the week was much of the same in terms of work. We cleared the track for a few days, adding large rocks either side of the track to stop tourists dropping down the steep valley as they walked around the reserve. We went to a uni night in town on wednesday, and it wasn't really a shock that the place was empty. It was Launceston afterall, a town where people disappear after 5pm. Not empty as in, there were a few people, but empty as in the people at this place were actually stacking away tables and chairs at 9:30. There was no one there but us, so we left quickly and went to Irish Murphys. That place wasn't too packed either, but it was good enough. Poor Guinness though, it tasted a little bit sour.

On Friday, we took wheelbarrows up and down the path about 1 Km, in order to lay down a bottom layer of gravel. It was one of the hottest days so far, and pushing wheelbarrows up and down the hill made us all knackered. Seriously, it was hard work, but we had so much fun joking around and relaxing in wheelbarrows when our team leader wasn't looking. That night we sat down to watch Die Hard, with 2 dominos pizzas and a lot of Boag's beers - el vino did flow!! The next morning Harry Tosis left and i'm sure he took the DVD remote control, so if i see him again i'm gonna squeeze some toothpaste into his mouth.

Saturday was '!!crazy day!!' in town where everything was on sale for one day only. It was a nice atmosphere, and it was the most people we'd ever seen in Launceston. We had our first Subway sandwiches in Launie that day, and they were good, real good -- and also cheap.

The CVA regional manager had got us tickets for an AFL footie game that evening so we were looking forward to seeing our newly adopted team, 'The Hawks' play the 'Adelaide Crows'. We weren't quite sure how to get to Aurora Stadium to see the game so we needed a taxi from our house. There was a card somewhere in our house which had Taxi written on it, and a number. We called it and there was an answering machine. A recorded voice said "press 1 for a taxi", so i followed her instructions, and then i heard "thank you for your requst". And that was it. We weren't quite sure if a request had been sent through, but we thought we'd give it a chance anyway and see if one turned up. We all grabbed our shoes, and went outside to wait. In less than 2 minutes a taxi had come and that was all, we jumped in to go to the Aurora Stadium. The match was great, quite a few people had turned up, and it was the first game of the season. I would need a whole new blog just to explain the rules of aussie football, but basically we enjoyed it. There were a lot of people supporting the Hawks, but we still got thrashed by the Crows. It was a lucky win for them, however we needed to some how recover from the loss. We went to a nearby fastfood stand on our way out, and got a couple of what the australians call, Dagwood Dogs. Its a hot dog shoved on a stick then battered and dunked in ketchup. Yummy! Go and try one, its a mini heart attack :)