Lazy day = handsewing little details on wedding favour bags with a cuppa tea, some chocolate, and Project Runway Season 6 marathon. Later on will be knitting in the sunny backyard.
I work in a fly-in mining camp on a 2 week schedule. That means that for two weeks out of the month, I'm in camp working 12 hour days for the full 14 days stright. That actually comes to 168 hours of work (the equivalent of a full months work based on a 40 hour week plus 8 hours overtime). We fly in on bush planes and small aircraft, and live in Atco trailers that have been sectioned off into individual rooms.
It's actually a really nice set up - we all have TV in our rooms and wireless internet (although it's so damn slow, I can barely open gmail much less upload images). There's a full kitchen and the chefs spoil us with very tasty dinners.
There's sometimes awkward moments of conversations with your boss in the dorm hallway in your pj's. I had one special moment with one of the older mill guys - I chanced running to the bathroom at 2 am in my pj's but sans bra, and it was *ahem* chilly in the hallways. The poor guy came out of the bathroom and got an eyeful of a firm *cough* problem through my top - the poor man flushes whenever we meet now. I definitely learned my lesson and there's now always a hoody hanging by the door for late night bathroom runs.
And then, after your two weeks in camp, you fly out and your cross-shift flys in (basically the other person who covers the same job as you during your time out), and you try to entertain yourself for two weeks without succumming to being a couch bum (I usually fail at this) while trying not to feel guilty as your boyfriend works 10 hour day
If you have any other questions about it, I'm glad to answer!
Oh, that's really interesting. I have a couple of cousins who did fly in fly out in Australia, but they were young guys on mining or power line set ups who just worked solid for 3 weeks and slept in tents, then went back to town and drank half their savings. Not a long term prospect! Yeah - there must be quite a bit of boundary stuff to adapt to living and working with the same people. What do you actually do while you're there? Is it mostly lab stuff or are you out in the field a lot? I can see the two weeks off being a challenge for lots of people, too. Great for crafts, though. For your profession is this likely to be a lifetime thing or is it a good way to get field experience for a few years?
AAHHHH! I responded to this within an hour of you posting it, and WHERE DID IT GO!!!??? Aw, I'm sorry to leave you hanging, Lyndle.
Exploration or construction camps are different than establish mining camps. Things get a little bit better scheduled, and you wind up with a better work/life ratio because of it. You're not in for weeks/months at a time, just to come out bushed and ready to party it up as soon as you get out (at least, not to the same extent).
I'm an underground geologist, which is as cool as it sounds! I go underground in the mornings, mapping and sampling the rock and giving blasting directions to try to follow the ore deposit (we mine copper, lead, zinc, and silver at our mine). Then I come up for a shower and lunch, then spend the afternoon's creating good copies of the maps, digitizing them, creating the daily report, and trying to help determine new mining areas and interpreting what the deposit is doing.
I think that I'm the sort of person who could continue doing this type of camp work for years, so long as it's equal time in/out. I'm lucky that I'm in the relationship I am, because we've done long distance in the past, so we're okay being apart for lengths of time, but still take advantage of our two weeks together when I'm home. We're also very independent people, so we sort of appreciate the time apart - makes us appreciate eachother more. It can be incredibly tough on relationships though, especially when you're just starting one. Down the road though, it might not work for us anymore - especially if we decide to start a family someday. We'll see! :)
I think I'm going to do a post on my new blog, talking about my job and camp work. I've had a lot of questions about it over the years, and it might be fun to share some photos of our camp!
Matchmaking is possible even online, you know. if you don’t want to hire a professional matchmaker and spend a fortune on that, try online matchmaking on Sofia Date. Just choose the parameters you need, click “Find my matches” and off you go! https://www.sofiadate.com/
Beautiful bags! Yes I'm interested in your life and how the on/off thing works. Is it full on in camp?
ReplyDeleteThanks!
DeleteI work in a fly-in mining camp on a 2 week schedule. That means that for two weeks out of the month, I'm in camp working 12 hour days for the full 14 days stright. That actually comes to 168 hours of work (the equivalent of a full months work based on a 40 hour week plus 8 hours overtime). We fly in on bush planes and small aircraft, and live in Atco trailers that have been sectioned off into individual rooms.
It's actually a really nice set up - we all have TV in our rooms and wireless internet (although it's so damn slow, I can barely open gmail much less upload images). There's a full kitchen and the chefs spoil us with very tasty dinners.
There's sometimes awkward moments of conversations with your boss in the dorm hallway in your pj's. I had one special moment with one of the older mill guys - I chanced running to the bathroom at 2 am in my pj's but sans bra, and it was *ahem* chilly in the hallways. The poor guy came out of the bathroom and got an eyeful of a firm *cough* problem through my top - the poor man flushes whenever we meet now. I definitely learned my lesson and there's now always a hoody hanging by the door for late night bathroom runs.
And then, after your two weeks in camp, you fly out and your cross-shift flys in (basically the other person who covers the same job as you during your time out), and you try to entertain yourself for two weeks without succumming to being a couch bum (I usually fail at this) while trying not to feel guilty as your boyfriend works 10 hour day
If you have any other questions about it, I'm glad to answer!
Oh, that's really interesting. I have a couple of cousins who did fly in fly out in Australia, but they were young guys on mining or power line set ups who just worked solid for 3 weeks and slept in tents, then went back to town and drank half their savings. Not a long term prospect!
DeleteYeah - there must be quite a bit of boundary stuff to adapt to living and working with the same people. What do you actually do while you're there? Is it mostly lab stuff or are you out in the field a lot?
I can see the two weeks off being a challenge for lots of people, too. Great for crafts, though. For your profession is this likely to be a lifetime thing or is it a good way to get field experience for a few years?
AAHHHH! I responded to this within an hour of you posting it, and WHERE DID IT GO!!!??? Aw, I'm sorry to leave you hanging, Lyndle.
DeleteExploration or construction camps are different than establish mining camps. Things get a little bit better scheduled, and you wind up with a better work/life ratio because of it. You're not in for weeks/months at a time, just to come out bushed and ready to party it up as soon as you get out (at least, not to the same extent).
I'm an underground geologist, which is as cool as it sounds! I go underground in the mornings, mapping and sampling the rock and giving blasting directions to try to follow the ore deposit (we mine copper, lead, zinc, and silver at our mine). Then I come up for a shower and lunch, then spend the afternoon's creating good copies of the maps, digitizing them, creating the daily report, and trying to help determine new mining areas and interpreting what the deposit is doing.
I think that I'm the sort of person who could continue doing this type of camp work for years, so long as it's equal time in/out. I'm lucky that I'm in the relationship I am, because we've done long distance in the past, so we're okay being apart for lengths of time, but still take advantage of our two weeks together when I'm home. We're also very independent people, so we sort of appreciate the time apart - makes us appreciate eachother more. It can be incredibly tough on relationships though, especially when you're just starting one. Down the road though, it might not work for us anymore - especially if we decide to start a family someday. We'll see! :)
I think I'm going to do a post on my new blog, talking about my job and camp work. I've had a lot of questions about it over the years, and it might be fun to share some photos of our camp!
That would be cool. Plus, if you keep enough notes, you might be able to turn them into magazine articles or a book one day!
ReplyDeletePs your job sounds fascinating. Thanks for the great replies!
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMatchmaking is possible even online, you know. if you don’t want to hire a professional matchmaker and spend a fortune on that, try online matchmaking on Sofia Date. Just choose the parameters you need, click “Find my matches” and off you go! https://www.sofiadate.com/
ReplyDelete