Ella & Helen

Travel information

We are currently

Description

Hello everyone !

I'm Helen, and have volunteered on workaway for many many summers now, made friends for life, learned an array of new skills and made some of my best memories with people I've met through workaway.
I previously did most of my workaways with my friend Ella, who sadly is not able to come this summer!

I am currently a primary school teacher in Ireland, and will be doing workaway for the summer :)

I grew up on a farm in the Irish countryside so I am no stranger to hard work and my experience on workaway has helped me to learn new tasks quickly, from gardening to strimming to clearing land.

I feel fellow travelers and workaway hosts' view on life is similar to mine and the Irish in general, especially in our love of meeting new people with a friendly face!

Living on a farm in rural Ireland means I have always felt most at home outdoors, and in my free time I love to spend time in the water, going for long walks around the hills of our farm, playing piano and trying out new recipes in the kitchen and I'd love to learn any local recipes you have while I'm there. I really love music -everything from Debussy to the Kinks-hopefully I’ll meet some others with the same taste on my travels :)

We left each workaway with new ideas about what makes a good life and what is fulfilling work and we realized that workaway is about so much more than the work-both us and the hosts always have something of value to share-for me that could be something as simple as sharing my favourite lentil dahl recipe with two of our wonderful hosts in Slovenia, while they told us about the changes they've experienced growing up since Slovenia split from Yugoslavia.
Workaway is really what you make of it and we learned the best way for everyone to enjoy the workaway experience is to respect the work that needs to be done but also help keep the atmosphere of the workaway an open and positive one to make sure the experience is as enjoyable as it can be.


P.S I am happy to video chat before I come if you wish, or to give you any references from our work :)

Interests

Movies & TV

Writing

Beach

Music

History

Water sports

Pets

Languages

Outdoor activities

Nature

Culture

Books

Animals

Languages

Languages spoken
English: Fluent
Irish: Fluent
French: Intermediate
Italian: Beginner

More details about my language interests
Helen is a qualified and experienced English teacher and would be happy to help with your English if that's something you would like

Find a language buddy

Skills and knowledge we'd like to share or learn

We're interested in:  

General Maintenance

Eco Projects

Charity Work

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Some knowledge of:  

Gardening

Creating/ Cooking family meals

Hospitality/Tourism

Languages

Helping with Computers/ Internet

Teaching

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Able to teach about:  

Life at a Farmstay

Helping around the house

Animal Care

More details about your skills

We did an array of jobs at all of the workaways, which involved both outdoor work and some hospitality.
Some of the skills we learned at our previous workaways include:
Vegetable gardening (planting, mulching, string training tomato plants, weeding etc.,)
Strimming, leaf-blowing, hedge-cutting, shredding wood
Sanding wood
Sanding and painting shutters
Digging trenches
Welcoming and checking in guests
Assisting chefs cook food for 90 guests
Housekeeping for a hotel which houses 90 guests
Bartending
Preparing breakfasts for 90 guests
Clearing brambles
Turning hay
Pool cleaning
Mucking out barns filled with donkeys and hens and trying to create a fitting environment for the hens to facilitate more egg-laying,
Campsite members, welcoming and checking in guests & helping them set up
Servers/bartenders in a restaurant
Prepping Air BnBs and gites for guests
Painting (indoors and outdoors)
Putting down paving slabs
General housekeeping



For some of these things it was our first experience doing that type of task, but we quickly learned that the best approach to workaway: we are always ready to give it a try, ask a question if we're confused but always give it our best and learning something along the way.

Age

27 & 26

What else ...

We are willing to work with you to make sure we both get the most out of workaway , and are really looking forward to meeting you.

Hopefully see you soon!
Helen

Some more information

• 

  Smoker

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  Driver's licence

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  Allergies
  N/A

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  Special dietary requirements
  I am pescatarian (mostly vegetarian) but I can also supply my own protein sources if it is difficult to accommodate non-meat eaters at your place :)