Well I officially started work on August 4th
at the apple farm in Bokhoven. Bokhoven is a small village nicely situated
along the Maas River. It’s not a very big place, but a beautiful location.
Henri has a few acres of apple trees there; I think we estimated around 1,400
with 6 different kinds of apples. Henri himself doesn’t live in Bokhoven, but
only a few kilometers away in Den Bosch.
There I met Dave (from Britain), Leo (young
student living in Den Bosch) and his brother, Rodrick.
We started our week off with picking the
rotten, old, rusted, bird eaten apples from the trees and then moved onto
pruning the trees to let more light in for the apples. They prune the trees
right before harvest so that the light can reach the apples and give them a bit
more color, that and cooler evenings help add the color to the apples.
It’s pretty peaceful walking through the
rows of trees; you don’t hear anything except the birds and wind, and sometimes
Henri singing.
Dave has been in the Netherlands on-and-off
for the last 16years, he came over here because there was better money to be
made then back in Britain. He says Britain still has really low minimum wage,
even crap wage for those who have a professional job and have been doing it for
years. Apparently a lot of people have left to find better-paid jobs in other
countries.
Henri first planted the trees back in the
early 90’s for something to do and to spend some more time outside, he started
organic and later on 6 different farm built a cooperative to help market and
sell there organic fruits to grocery stores in the country (the next farm I go
to is also a part of this cooperative). All three of his kids are grown up and
left the area for other careers, so I am not sure what he will do when he
decides to retire. But he is a super nice man and I can see why the people keep
coming back every year to work for him.
Leo is going to school to acquire all his
levels for carpentry and I think he hopes to go to Australia one day and find
work there with his family. Pretty nice kid and his brother, Rodrick came on Friday to
help out too; he just came back from Mexico where he had been volunteering in
orphanages. Now I think he is just looking to make some money and go traveling
again.
Everyone else will start next Monday for the picking season. It
sounds like all them are the usual people who come to work for Henri. I'm told there will be two other girls, one Dutch and one Polish and a few extra guys.
Mocha loves it in the apple fields, she
doesn’t go far and Henri appreciates that she doesn’t make much noise. She
hangs out in the shade, chases the frogs in the grass and sneaks into the
caravan for naps, so I think she is enjoying it. She is even pretty good with
the 30min bike ride in the basket there and back, she hasn’t barked yet and
sits most of the time, unless we are passing by the sheep – then she gets
excited. But she didn’t like the bike home in the rain, she was pretty soaked
by the time we got back, we both were. Maybe she needs a rain jacket, ha ha or
if I can make her lay down, I could throw a small quick dry towel or rain
jacket over. But thankfully I have a little electric heater for the camper and
she and my clothes were dried out in an hour!
We only worked a half-day on Friday, which
was great as I needed to go to Eindenhoven to get my BSN number (tax number)
and the brothers wanted to go fishing for the weekend. Didn’t spend much time
in the city, but got my number and off to the camping store to pick up a few
small things.
The weekend was spent driving around trying
to find the right stores for this and that with some laundry and cleaning on
the side. I attempted to rig up a mosquito netting from two sheets I bought at
the store, even bought a citronella candle and air device to see if that will
cut down on the many mosquito’s that haunt me at night. Apparently it is a bad
year for them, I have the bites on my arms and face to prove it, even one on my
eyelid – little buggers!! On early inspection before bed I didn’t find any, but
early in the morning a few buzzed by my head, so they must have a really good
hiding spot or are getting in another way. At least the mosquito netting seems
to work and I can have my sliding door open later in the evenings to cool off
the van on warm days, but the temperature has started to drop.
This was a short week as well as we finished all the pruning of the trees and are all ready for picking starting next Monday. An extra day off, but with the rain coming and going, not sure if much will get done but some lazing around mixed with some short walks and bike rides.
Excited to meet the new people on Monday and start picking the apples and see how it goes, hopefully it's good work as it will be in the plans for the next 10 weeks!
(Heusden)
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