We had organised a last minute workaway as we needed to catch a flight from Hamilton, Ontario in just over a weeks time so couldn't stray too far away from the area. When this opportunity in Kitchener came through we had to take it. We had contacted a number of workaways but due to the last minute nature of our request several said no and a couple said yes - if we couldn't find anywhere else.
Luckily, a wonderful man called Tony responded and said we were more than welcome. It was the exact hospitality we were looking for after a rather rocky end to our stay in Brantford. It was a little nerve wracking as we were essentially going to stay with a complete stranger for a week. Emma is a fan of crime shows so thoughts about serial killers, especially in the Canadian countryside did go through her mind!
We were collected by Tony late in the evening and driven to his home. His home sat about 35 minutes north of Brantford but south of Kitchener. During the car journey, we learnt that Tony has an adopted son who is a keen mechanic and another workawayer from Mexico was living with him as well. Tony had sadly lost his wife a few years earlier so enjoyed the company of workawayers from all over the world, plus the help they could offer around the home.
Tony had recently started a new career and was in the middle of training to be a truck diver and was aiming to complete his training during our stay. Luckily he passed and within a few days of our stay he was off to Vancouver for a delivery!
His house was a small two story home in the process of being renovated. He'd built an extension onto the back of the house to all space for a lounge. It was a lovely large sunny room and will be perfect for the warm summer afternoons (and reading a book on winter mornings!)
We stayed in a spare room which had a double bed - which took some getting used to after a month of being in individual single beds!
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| Our new home! |
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| Our room. |
Volunteering
As per the usual workaway agreement we worked 5 days a week, 5 hours a day on whatever Tony needed. Our job for this workaway was to organise and catalogue boxes. The lounge and dining rooms were full of clutter and boxes, so we knew we would be kept busy! Once the boxes had been organised, they needed to be moved to the basement. As with all Canadian homes, the basement is essentially an extra floor, which meant plenty of storage space!
Tony offered full board and food with this workaway, which meant we were able to save some pennies during this week.
The only surprise was to find out that the house was built on swamp land which meant they get snakes during the spring months. How did we find out? we found a snake, behind a box in the basement. Terrifying.
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| Clearing space for boxes and hoping to not find snakes! |
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| Some down-time with Ruben the Mexican workawayer. |
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| The lounge after cleaning and tidying! |
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| The dining room after some organisation and cleaning. |
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| New storage space! |
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| Reorganisation & storage! |
The Location
As mentioned above, Tony's house was in the countryside. We also had no car so we had to walk 40minutes to the public library to get a decent internet connect and to get any groceries. This did mean we had a daily stop at Tim Hortons for a doughnut and some coffee.... oops! We didn't see much else of Kitchener unfortunately, we enjoyed staying at Tony's and our daily walks to civilisation.
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| Sights along the walk to the llibrary! |
Catching some R&R!
Essentially this workaway was perfect for some relaxation and recuperation. Getting back to basics with limited wifi, reading more, daily long walks, continuing to eat healthily and get some of our own time back. We caught up on wedding planning, stag do planning and ourselves.
We thoroughly enjoyed our stay with Tony, it was a great sense of accomplishment giving him his lounge and dining room back. The rooms were reorganised and cleaned meaning they could be used as soon as Tony gets back from his trip.
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| Reading. |
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| Food. |
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| Relaxation. |
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