Hi guys, I was asked in a previous thread if I could provide further info on how my wife and I have gone about working our way around OZ for the last few years for the benefit of others who may be thinking about doing the same thing. I am definately no expert but I will share what I know and how we have gone about it as it may be of interest
to some. Firstly I will say that we have worked in NSW, SA, WA and QLD and now WA again and our working times have been some of the
best times we have had. We have met the real locals instead of just the travellers at
camp sites etc and really experienced
places and what it's like
to live there and be part of the community. We have also made many great friends who we regularly keep in contact with and visit and who always offer us a place
to stay when we are in their neck of the woods and them in ours. We would never have met any of these great people had we not stopped and worked in their town. I am blessed in a way that my wife is a nurse and nursing work is in high demand all over the country. I am a sheetmetal worker/welder which is also handy but not nearly as much. When we first left we would simply travel until we started getting low on cash and then stop wherever we were and start looking for work (knocking on doors, looking at notice boards etc). This was not an effective technique as often there is only 1 hospital/workshop etc and if there was no jobs and we were low on cash it could be quite stressful. We soon learned that organising work in advance was the
best/easiest/least stress approach. Nowadays we finish a working stint, look how much money we have saved, workout roughly how long until we have
to work again and then look at the map and decide roughly where we will be at that
time. Our first port of call is
to email/phone any hospitals etc in the area and see if nursing work is available in say 3 months or whatever, usually this is a yes and they will email an employment contract straight back after some reference checks. Then we meander our way there enjoying life with the comfort of knowing that when we get low on cash we have work organised. I then just look for work when we get there and I don't always find welding jobs but there is always something around and whilst we have one income it is not stressful and I have always found work within 2 weeks, often 1. Everywhere we have worked we have been asked
to stay and it has been sad
to leave. When we are deciding where
to work next we base our decision solely on which area of the country we want
to see and spend
time in and not "where the work is" or "where they're paying well", if we did that we would have spent all our
time in Karratha/Hedland/Kalgoorlie etc which does not interest us at all and I believe if we did that we would probably have gone
home by now. I have also found that areas where there is apparently "heaps of work" we have had more trouble finding it than when I just pick a town at random in an area we would like
to spend some
time. Often they jump at the opportunity
to employ fresh faces in town. Overall we have found WA and QLD
to pay the
best in our respective trades and SA the worst but in saying this we have spent nearly 12 months in SA altogether because we love it, from the Flinders
to the coastline of the Western Eyre Peninsula. We have not used any job finding websites and the few I have joined just bombard me with useless emails. Just decide where you want
to be when, and pick up the phone or shoot off some emails. This is how we go about it anyway and it has been working so far. We just arrived in
Esperance after doing the
Birdsville Track/Googs Track/Anne Beadell, where we had lined up work for Nicole at the Hospital (she starts next week) whilst we were still working up in North Qld. I will start looking for work next week. Anyhow, I hope some of this info has been helpful
to somebody. Happy travels. Luke and Nicole (and Peggy our 9yo staffy)