Well, for two months I have worked at Aldinga Park, a cattle station in Rolleston. For the first week I worked with Terry Piggott (my boss) and Ashley, the station hand, at a set of cattle yards at the other side of the property. It took about an hour to drive from the homestead to the yards and it was all 4x4 off road over the mountains and creeks that litter the property everywhere.In the following weeks of work I mustered cattle a lot around the station on horseback which was really fun. One of the musters was from a paddock called iron bark, a paddock by the cattle yards on the other side of the property. It was a really long muster and took me, terry, ashley and terry's wife, Katherine, all day. We boxed the horses out there and boxed them back when we brought the cattle back up to iron bark.Most of they time I was working at aldinga I waqs fencing.Firstly the fencline had to be marked out, then the posts had to be cut and barked using Budjuroo trees. The next thing to do was dig the holes for the posts using the tractor and the ogre, thankfully not by hand like at the training ranch!! After that we had to plant the wooden posts in the holes and ram then in with the crowbar so that they stayed in solidly and were sturdy. After that we had to cut the steel posts for the corners and the strainers and poles to weld between the corner posts to make them even stronger. Then we had to concrete the posts in. For this we had to use the flatbed lorry/cattle truck to transport all the sand/cenent/gravel/water/mixer/wheelbarrow etc. After a rather heavy rainfall of 80mm we went out cementing with the flatbed which ash drove and the tractor which I was driving. Somehow Ash got the truck really badly bogged and made me pull him out with the tractor. Bearing in mind I had only driven a tractor a handful of times, its a shock that I only snapped the ogre when towing him out...when I eventually got him out that is! Well after we finally finished cementing we put the wire up and banged in the steelies using the air compresser powered badoiing. I had to drive the red toyota. Not a good move, lets just say that me and the red toyota dont get on, I managed to stall it sooo many times and to loose controll and reverse through a newly put up piece of wire...oops!! At least I missed the steelie and the wooden post! When I was working at aldinga I stayed in the cottage at the homestead with ashley. The homestead comprised of the cottage, terrys place, the barn, horseyards and a little further away the cattle yards and the shed.
