TRACEY BENDINGER | Primary Industries | Contact
The trials and tribulations of Claire and Tess McLeod captured the hearts and minds of Australians for nearly a decade. Their realistic representation of life on the farm inspired an entire generation of men and women to drop the pens and pick up rake – however, as Hannah Ankerton (26) is just finding out, working on the land in real life is a little different to the way McLeod’s portrayed it.
Hannah is only in her first week of working on Pearson Downs, one of the larger cattle stations in QLD Channel Country, but she is already thinking about calling it quits.
“Where are all the hot neighbours? And the 2-hour breakfasts around the kitchen table?” Hannah complained to one of our reporters.
“I’m about to go camping for 4 nights while we try to muster the cattle, what the actual fuck?”
The Advocate understands a staggering 68% of potential Jillaroos and Jackaroos end up quitting within the first fortnight because the work isn’t what they imagined it would be.
Local entrepreneur and owner of Diamantina Air Freight And Charter, Nathan Campositos, is capitalizing on this high withdrawal rate, by offering GMTFO deals to desperate city-slickers who want to do exactly that, get the fuck out.
“Yeah so, I’ll usually do a couple trips up there a week, fly ‘em back down here.”
“They’re so desperate to leave they don’t even mind forking out the $350 for a short flight – I’m raking in enough to put my grandkids through private school!” Gary said almost disbelievingly.
With McLeod’s up on 9’s online streaming service, we anticipate there’ll be a lot more wannabe farmers with broken dreams to come.
