Entries about rosebank

Rosebank is a thriving village on the edge of some of the region's most beautiful rainforest.

The next short chapter of my adventure took me to Shaun & Carmel's macadamia farm for a new learning experience!

Home for myself and Nina (another workawayer) was the studio

The farm had spectacular views over the Hinterland

even in the rain

First up was a tour of the farm, from the front of the tractor!

through the long, long, long grass

and to visit Robbie and Midnight

Robbie is Shaun's handsome horse

with a fettish for licking the metal gate, which I assume was for minerals

I took Robbie to the house paddock to spend some time with him,

but he missed his companion too much!
Midnight is Robbie's 40 year old companion!

who was very kean to see Robbie return

The horses enjoyed quite a view, which reminded me of home, Soemrset

Other animals included Poro & Molly, two Kelpies

Poro was the wiser, older dog,

but very, very stick focussed, even jumping to the trees if it landed there!

and Molly was only 8months old,

but obsessed with Poro!

wherever I went, Poro (and therefore Molly) followed

Nina & I were given a very warm welcome, in the form of a Rosebank Shed Party, with the local friend and neighbours

Carmel exercised her talent as a musician, and we all joined in

as the evening got colder, the huddle around the fire got closer!

The Macadamia's were the main focus of the farm,

with 30 acres of orchard

and we made quite a team;
Nina on the grass cutter

me on the tractor (with the help of the dogs of course)

and Shaun on the harvester

...which became my task to fix when it got clogged up with dirt and dust!

20 rotating fingers, and each one ceased on!

Once the nuts were harvested they look a bit like this

Work was carried out in the nut shed

where they were fed into the hopper


and fed through to the de-husker


which wasn't fun when it went wrong, and carried on feeding nuts...onto the floor...ops

luckily Shaun was on hand to fix it

The nuts then fell through to the conveyor belt

to the sorting table

where Nina & I picked out the good, the bad and the ugly

based on these issues, such as splitting, rotten, nut borer damage

Finally, we produced s a crate of finished nuts ready for sale to the wholesaler

and after all this, there was some serious pruning to be done, and burnt. At the back of this pile is the tractor, hidden by the branches!

but with the rain, it took a good fire starter to get it going

and then the green wood burnt with firework sound effects

After all the hard work out, a few nights out were earnt, including the local pub, where Carmel and others played

Dinner with some lovely neighbours, Dee and CarieAnne (with Carmel)

the local 'all schools' production of Aladdin

which was very good, especially considering the ages ranged from 9 to 18yrs old

which was preceded by the local Belly Dancing club

and decorated with the children's lanterns, designed and built for the Lantern Parade the following week

Another treat was fresh bread from the neighbour's new hand built bread over

producing lovely Turkish and fruit bread for lunch

Another stay, another great pile of memories!