We’re just going to jump right into things this week!

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Monday was spent as a proper “get my life together/organized.”  With tomorrow being my first day back to work after a few months jobless (but thriving I’ll add haha), I had quite a bit of general life admin stuff to check off, with final work forms to fill, grocery shop, computer clean out, van tidying, cooking, emails, etc.

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Initially Tuesday was meant to be the first official day of training, but because work was still waiting on a few other trainees to get into town, myself and another trainee, Jono, got to go on the West McDonnell’s tour for the day!  We had such a fun day with our co-worker, Felipe, leading the tour – getting to visit some really beautiful sites and future swimming locations when the weather gets warmer.  We stopped at Simpsons Gap, Standley Chasm, Ochre Pits, Ormiston Gorge, Ellery Creek Bighole (my personal fave), and Flynn Memorial.    I ended up heading to the hostel my boss owns to get set up for the next couple weeks, and met some other coworkers + fellow tour guides from other companies (Takk (coworker), Tye, Troy, and Ash. All super lovely individuals).

Today was also a spider-experience filled day lol.  It was pretty funny and ironic, and I’m pretty sure I jinxed myself.  During one of the walks on the tour I was telling Jono how I was pretty surprised that in 3 months in Australia, I hadn’t had any notable spider experiences or seen any of the “crazy” spiders you always see on the internet, and how I kept telling family/friends it just really isn’t that bad here. And he was replying “yeah it’s not too bad but you know, you definitely do come across them eventually – like that one right there” then proceeds to point not even a metre above my head, a huge golden orb ___ and I freaked! LOL the timing was just too good and I was not expecting it to be as close as it was.  We had such a good laugh about it before I was finally collected enough to get a proper look at them.  They make those crazy matted messy looking webs that just feel all the gaps between the trees and branches (they look terrifying).

Then, when I was getting ready for bed I found a spider on my pillow (wasn’t anything big or bothersome) and it was beginning to feel like a message being sent by the spider gods because what came next I swear gave me a damn near heartattack.

Once I was ready for bed, I was just sitting on the floor in my van next to my door, organizing things, when all of the sudden, not even a foot away from me was the most terrifying spider emerging from between the door seal.  I was absolutely shook and had NO idea it was just a huntsman (these are quite common and completely harmless – aussies love these guys as they get out all the bugs. Some jokingly keep them as “roommates”).  In the moment I was very certain this thing could kill me if they wanted to because they looked SO scary (and mine was a small guy compared to how big they can actually get…).  Thankfully they didn’t run in to the van, so I was able to open the door a swoosh them out with my shoe, but when I tell you I had troubles falling asleep that night… I mean I spent the next hour worrying I would wake up to at least two in my van around my head somewhere lol.

Thankfully there have been no other spider encounters since (yet).

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Wednesday we had our first training day, and got to meet the rest of our training group (Lynda, Cata, and George).  We spent a full day going through all the super dull, dry, typical onboarding stuff. Afterwards, Takk and I did a quick grocery run, and met up with Cata+Jono back at the hostel for some beers and ice cream.  The rest of the evening was spent making dinner and  hanging out with everyone!

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The rest of the week was honestly pretty brutal.  Thursday we had another full day of dull training and I ended up getting sick with the flu… so the next 3.5 days were spent dying in the van as I burned and slept off the sickness.  Was pretty sad because I missed out on the groups first trip to Uluru and a trip to the climbing gym, but thankfully I’m making pretty decently quick recovery.  Still have a pretty bad cough and some congestion, but managed to start feeling well enough to get out and functioning again Sunday evening – got to meet another new trainee co-worker, Pablo!

One highlight while being sick though was I got to watch the count down for and listen to Ed Sheeran’s new album release on Saturday hehe.

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I’ll be honest in that while this week was a lot of fun connecting with new people, the energy is still real low as I’m finally come out of the woodworks.  I’ve kept this week’s descriptions quite minimal as I’m still recovering from being sick all weekend, and brain fog is still hanging around.  There will be lots more fun updates to share next week!

Stay passionate and curious,
Hunter 💛