Perks of having awesome colleagues

My Monday this week has been incredible. A woman I work with, Emerald, lives on a lifestyle block and breeds horses. She offered to take me on an after work ride with her. She does this most evenings so was happy to have someone to go around with. The whole experience was just breathtaking. At first it was rather daunting and my horse seemed to dislike going up hill, going down hill or walking in general really! After a while though I settled into it more and relaxed which helped both the horse, Jay-Jay, and I enjoy it more. They own gorgeous land on the hills just outside Geraldine with an abundance of wildlife. We saw so many deer and stags as well as wild sheep and goats. Emerald's partner runs a side hunting business so takes customers out in to the bush they own to shoot mainly stags. I don't agree with it but it was reasurring to see how many stags there are and how they are thriving despite this threat. One thing I didn't realise was that Emerald's partner wasn't actually home so when we went on our trek with left her 4 year old son in the care of her 12 year old daughter. When I arrived they were playing outside on the trampoline together and 2 hours later they were still playing outside with their Shetland pony. They weren't spending time on phones, computers or games but enjoying the amazing home and grounds they have to roam in. Everything is enclosed so they feel completely fine leaving them alone like this. I couldn't get over the awesome childhood she is providing for them and I was rather jealous of the lifestyle they have. This week Nick has been super on it with the cleaning and packing. On my day off we tackled a lot of the cleaning together so hopefully we will be ready by the time our inspection comes. I think he's eager to get going and leave the farm life behind us for a while. There was the potential of having to stay at my colleagues house because our house might have been needed for new workers but luckily we're able to stay up until the 3rd or 4th. It's nice knowing we have that extra time and don't have to move into somewhere for a couple of days to move out again. The freedom that travelling will bring us is getting so close now that we're both just eager to hit the road and see this beautiful country.Read more