Stay with an ecologist and chef/trainer couple and exchange skills and languages in north Queensland, Australia

Infos

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  Description

  My partner and I are converting a small yard into a permaculture garden. We know a lot about horticulture and sustainability, have space for 2-3 people and would love to share skills and get help for our ongoing projects.
  
  Both of us (Kelly and Jim) travelled overseas from 2016-2021 as Workaway guests so we have experience as helpers. I want our guests to have good experiences with us, and we have hopefully created a good space for travellers to park up, share our lives, help us out a bit and leave having learned a lot from each other and gained a lot of positive experiences overall.
  For any guests travelling with minors: we both have our Child Safety Blue Cards.
  We are a smoking and drinking home with designated smoking areas. Kelly has a lot of family living close by, you are welcome to meet them if you want, they love meeting cultural exchange people because we don’t travel much, but we love to hear stories about what the rest of the world is up to.
  
  Jim and I live alone and keep ducks, mealworm, compost worms and a beehive. We live in a quiet suburban neighbourhood in a small town about 20 minutes drive from Mackay. This is a host site that is in the suburbs, but it is a very quiet suburb in a regional town. We aren’t TOO far from either the city centre, or the countryside, or the beach.
  
  This site might really suit people in campervans/small caravans that want to park up for a fortnight, recharge, do some repairs, tidy the camper, wash everything and reset for the next leg during the workstay.
  
  It is autumn/winter time here now, which is the best time to visit if you are from down south or from the colder parts of the Northern Hemisphere! Temperatures are 10-25°C, and there is usually low rainfall this time of year so you can enjoy plenty of sunshine and warm temperatures during the day, and you just put on a pair of pants and long socks at night because we don’t even really get frosts here. The types of foods we are harvesting now include passionfruit, coconuts, bananas, mulberries, papaya, turmeric and ginger, which gives you an idea of how warm it still is here.

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  Types d'aide et opportunités d'apprendre

  Projets artistiques

  Aide avec des éco-projets

  Jardinage

  Bricolage et construction

  S’occuper des animaux

  Aide dans une ferme

  Baby-sitting et jeux créatifs

  Aide à la maison

  Entretien général

  Aide informatique/internet
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  Centres d’intérêt

  

  LGBT+

  

  Végétarien ou végan

  

  Dev. durable

  

  Animaux de compagnie

  

  Ferme

  

  Bénévolat

  

  Art et design

  

  Soin des plantes

  

  Bricolage / artisanat

  

  Jardinage

  

  Cuisine et alimentation

  

  Dessin et peinture

  

  Animaux

  

  Yoga / bien-être

  

  Nature

  

  Randonnée

  

  Plage

  

  Montagne
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  Echange culturel et opportunités d'apprendre

  Social activities (this is just a few ideas - we can find more based on your interests):
  We can show you some of the local scenic nature sights like see platypus in Eungella, or walk on quiet clean beaches to admire sea anemones, or take you fishing or crabbing, attend show openings at Artspace, drive out west to look for emus in the wild. There is a tabletop gaming shop in Mackay that we are keen to visit but we very new to the genre so would love to be shown around by someone in the know!
  Skills and knowledge we can share: cooking (partner is trained chef), beekeeping, winemaking, herbal skincare, soil remediation, animal care, backyard poultry, tropical gardening, English reading & writing, plant lore, crochet, worm farms, rewilding in the suburbs
  We are very welcoming to LGBTQIA+ travellers, singles or couples. We are also happy to host people travelling with kids, dogs or cats, provided that they are well-behaved and safe around the ducks. Cats need to be on leashes outside to protect native wildlife populations.
  We hope to learn a lot by hosting people of different cultures, like new ways of seeing the world, how to communicate better, learning different words from different languages, seeing our home anew through the eyes of our wonderful guests!

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  Projets impliquant des enfants

  Ce projet peut impliquer des enfants. Pour en savoir plus, consultez nos directives et conseils ici.

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  Aide

  The kind of help we would like is around 4hrs per day, 4 days per week (shifts 8-11am, 11.30am-12.30pm).
  Days ideally look like this:
  Hosts serve breakfast prior to shift (7-8am) and lunch after shift (1pm), and supply a light smoko during the shift (11-11.30).
  
  Days will be different, but includes animal care, building, pruning, mulching, digging, planting, sowing, scrubbing, construction, measuring, planning, harvesting, dehydrating, power washing, dusting, vacuuming - everything needed to run a suburban homestead, basically. We have a lot of deep-cleaning tasks that need to be done after the summer rain, inside and outside the house, like power-washing the driveway, or pulling out the fridge and cleaning behind it.
  Some tasks will be boring but if we tackle them as a crew we can tick them off quickly to get to the fun stuff. I would like each week to be a mix of necessary but boring tasks and also tasks you would like to learn more about (maybe native trees, cobb-building, or the beekeeping, or niche jobs like pollinating vanilla orchids?).
  Happy to create accommodated tasks for kids or different abilities along the way - please just communicate what your ideal outcomes are for your stay so we can know how to support and do the best for everyone.
  
  We work as a team in the evening to cook a dinner for an hour or two (splitting the cooking/cleaning chore equally, resetting the kitchen for the morning). So on work days, we all are fed and ready to go by 8am, knock off for lunch and siesta by 1. Dinners will probably be between 7-9pm which we would have as a group. We will also supply this on your days off, but every day if you are participating in dinner, we see that as a household chore that everyone needs to pitch in equally, not as part of the shift.
  
  We will be doing tasks together and sharing skills on the way - we can offer beekeeping, tropical food gardening, poultry keeping, landcare and sustainability skills. I would love to meet someone to teach me more about how to woodwork and carpentry, how to construct and build simple things like tables and supports for rain barrels strongly and safely.
  
  Kelly has a lot of dream projects she would love to see created: a pond for the ducks, an outside shower, an outside kitchen, fixing the integrity of the fence, a front yard water feature as part of a local frog breeding program….
  We have a lot of skills skills and would like to learn more, please message to show us your profile and tell us about yourselves.

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  Langues

  Langues parlées
  Anglais: Courant

  Cet hôte propose un échange linguistique
  My partner and I would love to host Deaf or hard of hearing people too, we only know how to fingerspell in Auslan but are keen to learn more Auslan language and how to communicate better with members of the Australian Deaf community.
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  Hébergement

  We have two private bedrooms for our guests, one with single bed, one with queen.
  Bedrooms have empty inbuilt closets.
  The house has one toilet and one bathroom (toilet separate from bathroom).
  Facilities for our guests: Wifi, washing machine, dryer, dishwasher, 240V external outlet for campervan, freezer space for cold storage (fridge usually full sorry), air conditioning, air fryer
  
  We can host a camper (under ~2.4m) or small teardrop-style caravan in our undercover area, and there is an outlet close for you to connect to, or a parking spot if you bring a car.
  We have shed space to accommodate small builds or repairs too.
  
  How the food will work:
  *we are an omnivorous household, but due to high cost of living, we eat a mainly vegetarian diet. Happy to adapt to vegans. Happy to cook with more meat and fish if any of our guests enjoy hunting or fishing. We cook a lot of low GF, low-acid sides, mainly European dishes with cheese, eggs, butter, or milk. We would love to learn more simple and healthy dishes from other cultures!
  Our food budget does not really stretch to a lot of processed food/snack treats so please BYO junk food, alcohol, tobacco etc.
  
  Example of a day's meals:
  7-8.00am Breakfast: Cereal/muesli, fruit, yoghurt, coffee/tea, toast, eggs
  11-.11.30am Smoko: coffee, fruit, biscuits
  12.30 knock off time (work hours 8.00-11.00, 11.30-12.30 = 4hrs)
  1pm Lunch: Big lunch (things like quiche, salad, lebanese cucumbers, crackers, cut fruit, bread, hummus, cordial, tea) followed by siesta/relax o’clock for guests
  Dinner 7-8pm: Lighter dinner, (things like soups (miso, french onion, minestrone), soft-boiled eggs, toasts, fried rice, mediterranean roast veg, collared greens, custard and fruit for dessert. BYO wine, cider etc)
  
  Domestic duties (cooking daily communal meals, kitchen cleandown) are tasks we all share and execute as a group to come together and connect at the beginning and end of each day.

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  Autres infos...

  Transport: We can pick you up from the airport if you want to fly into Mackay.
  Our town has one of most things: a pub, bottleO, post office, supermarket, chemist, mechanic, library, pizza shop, Asian takeaway, fish and chips, butcher, baker, cafe, hairdresser, church…but only ONE of each because it is small. All these shops are a 10 minute walk or a 5 minute bike ride from our house. There is also a Translink bus to Mackay most days, fares are.50c each. If we are heading in you are welcome to get a lift. If you have a car or motorbike of your own to get around with, even better!
  
  To get around our area: Public transport is limited, shops are within walking distance, we have one adult bicycle. Jim will be able to give you lifts into Mackay or Marian on his way to work most days. Having your own transport will definitely help you get around better. Please no hitch-hiking for your own personal safety.
  
  We have lots of suggestions for what people can do in their time off, just let us know what you are interested in and we could recommend things tailored to you.
  
  Houserules:
  Our site is a registered biosecurity entity, if you have been to other farms, especially with BEES or POULTRY please let us know - we need observe biosecure practices (like washing under cars and disinfecting boots).
  Smoking is outside only in designated areas.
  Move safely around the ducks - they will walk up behind you and could get accidentally stepped on. Only bring dogs you would trust around your own delicate small animals.
  If you have ratting dogs, you will need to keep an eye on them because people bait rats in our area and they could be poisoned. There are a couple of local vets in case of emergencies, they are expensive but will provide good care 24/7
  Cats need to be on leashes outside to protect native wildlife populations.

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  Informations complémentaires

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    Accès Internet

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    Accès Internet limité

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    Nous avons des animaux

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    Nous sommes fumeurs

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    Familles bienvenues

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  Possibilité d’accueillir les digital nomads

  We have not worked with digital nomads before this, please let us know what you need and we can check to make sure we have what you need to support your career.

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  Espace pour garer des vans

  Nowhere to dump black or grey water here, but there are likely facilities within 10-15 minutes drive of our home for you to dump out.

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  Possibilité d'accueillir les animaux

  I have already discussed cats and dogs, if you are travelling with other pets just let us know so we can prepare - we aren't too alarmed by most creatures, and we don't have any inside pets. Probably goes without saying but you are responsible for your animals waste. All dog and cat poops need to picked up and disposed of in an ecologically sustainable manner, and any pet habitats brought inside cannot get smelly, for the sake of everyone in the house.

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  Combien de volontaires pouvez-vous accueillir ?

  Plus de 2

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