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THE WORK4TRAVEL FRONTIER CLUB
For picture captions hold mouse cursor over picture. As a traveller for adventure you'll participate in all kinds of interesting and varied activities and enjoy all manner of unusual experiences. Working a little along the way makes it all possible. |
WORK & TRAVEL COMPANIONS
Travel Friends Often the hardest part in making the decision to travel and work overseas is taking the first step, and you may be a little apprehensive about going overseas for the first time, particularly on your own. Some members like to team-up and travel/work together, or in small groups - from working holidays of just a couple of weeks to Round-the-World trips of a year or more. Others like to start with a working holiday at one of our own sites where everything is organised and they can get into the swing of things.
"Thanks for the most fantastic time. To think that just a few months ago I was on the 9-5 drag, with a miserable boss. I used to dream of waking up in some far off place, and then I heard about your club! That was the day that turned my dream into reality. "The Club has literally changed my life. I never imagined I would be travelling 6,000 miles and joining up with the greatest bunch of people. Now I’m ready to embark on the Work & Travel adventure of a lifetime, with one of the members I met. Thanks."… Carol Ann
"Don’t want to travel alone? Do what I did and team-up with another member. "My circumnavigation began on 5th November, a good time of year to leave Weymouth ... Thailand surpassed all our expectations and the wonders of the country and its people enveloped us. We stayed in ramshackle beach huts at the jaw-dropping cost of $2.50 a night in an idyllic situation where stunning rock formations jutted out of the water, and when the tide was out we could walk to shell-strewn islands with fascinating rock pools … It took just one rice and squid meal at $1.50, some bourbon and coke combined with the hot lazy days ..." Kate: From her story A Sarong to Travel BEER DELIVERY NEW YORK - Ray White
"It all started at High Peaks in the Adirondack Park - the largest in the USA outside Alaska, with 2,760 lakes and 30,000 miles of rivers and streams. "I joined a small team helping to clear blocked trails after a huge ice storm had created havoc and cut-off electricity to part of the city of Montreal for two weeks. It was literally devastation with thousands of trees flattened, others bent over, and oaks as big as a foot across snapped in half like a match.
"The weather was extremely hot in the summer, but glorious in fall with nice crisp, bright, sunny days. The fall foliage was a sight to behold - every colour in the rainbow, which is why there was a constant stream of tour buses passing by. "As our work finished early we were able to spend the remaining time simply enjoying the outdoors during the day, and having great 'parties' in the evening. As those were held a different locations in the mountains it became my cherished 'job' to ferry-in the beer for the guys and champagne for the girls. I'd like to say that I'll never forget that summer and autumn, but parts of it are a bit of a blur - but we did work hard as well ..." Ray White MOUNTAIN HIGH - Terry Cooper
"Everything was arranged for me including my plane ticket and I was met on arrival, put up at a hotel for the night before driving the several hundred miles through range after range of mountains to a base near the site. It was September and gloriously hot - hotter in fact than an earlier trip to Spain - with glorious blue skies every day.
"The first heavy truckload and trailer of lumber almost didn't make it due to steep grades and became stuck on one occasion, needing a bulldozer to pull it up! It usually took 4-hours to go the 40-miles to the nearest point where the helicopter could lift supplies into our work site! "Loaded up again later that day with more lumber and aviation fuel for refuelling the helicopters, we made ready to meet two helicopters on top of the mountain at noon the next day. The heavy lifting helicopter made 15 trips with supplies dropping them via a 120-foot cable to a narrow ledge on the side of the mountain near the entrance to the gold mine.
"We took over an old miner's cabin during initial construction phases of the bunkhouse - great fun, almost like living back in the golden olden days. Some names carved in the logs above my bunk were over 100-years old. I added mine over the door. It was hard to believe that I was sleeping on top of millions and millions of dollars in gold and silver ore. "On one of our days off we found the old 1898 packhorse trail to the site in remarkable condition. Not sufficient time to follow it all the way down the mountain as it zigzags for about 15-miles before reaching a huge lake and the railroad line. It's hard to imagine how the miners all those years ago were able to pack everything into the mine on this trail. "It was an absolutely incredible site to work on and an unbelievable experience. My last night was spent again in the hotel with a sumptuous farewell dinner. The next morning I started my journey back to the UK from a small local airfield tucked into the mountains ..." Terry Cooper |
Work
& Travel Companions 
We
have been very successful over the years in bringing people together and some
great and long lasting friendships have been made in this way.
"Everyone
should do it. It should be made a national requirement. An enriching,
unforgettable experience to widen your horizons and instil the knowledge that
there is a life beyond mortgages and miserable weather - take a year out and
travel the world - take a job abroad. It may seem a scary proposition but
believe me, when you’re doing it, it couldn’t be easier.
"I
never imagined myself as a 'beer delivery' driver in New York - and least of all
in a rally kart and on quad bike!
"Fortunately
the bunkhouse where we stayed, right on the edge of a canyon, had been
remarkably spared as had the sheds that stored the ATVs and other equipment.
"All
I knew when I left Aberdeen, Scotland, was that I would be working at an old
gold mine in the Columbia Mountains. I had seen some Club pictures of the
spectacular location, which tempted me to go, and had been fully briefed on what
to expect. I would be helping to transport supplies to the mine over three high
mountain passes - the final leg by helicopter - for the construction of a
bunkhouse.
"We
stayed in a hotel for the first few days while supplies, trucks and helicopters
were organised and then I had my first trip in to the site by Jeep bouncing over
40-miles of single track dirt road, climbing up steep gradients and over the
three mountain passes, only open for three months a year due to the altitude.
"My
job here was monitoring communications with the helicopters and unhitching
cables while they hovered overhead. We nearly lost one load when the pilot
dragged it off the unloading area and instead of climbing up to the site started
dropping lower into the valley. The load was too heavy. However, with extra lift
away from the edge of the mountain he was slowly able to recover and I got the
message on my radio to stand clear as he jettisoned the load into the side of
the mountain just below us!