The Two Musketeers

Having made mention of our United Nations grape picking team in our last newsletter, we should point out how valuable our overseas visitors were during pruning.

After the harvest finished, two fine soldiers from the Grande Armee Australien, Romain Saint-Juvin and Benoit Guyot headed off, in the tradition of Napoleon, to conquer the north. Unluckily for them but fortunate for us, work above the 26th Parallel was as hard to find as a victory in Moscow, so they made the long march in their old, white Falcon, back down the west coast, to face the southern cold. We gratefully accepted them back and they settled in for a winter in the Wilyabrup horizontal rain, helping us with the pruning.

It is not normally the case for the working holiday visa crew to be further south than Carnarvon during June, July and August. Most visitors, especially Europeans, who have come to Australia to enjoy the warm weather, like to be up in Broome, Darwin or Cairns at that time of year, so it’s rare for them to stay and we were pleased they did.

Once they settled back in, they got into the winter spirit of this region – make the most of the fine weather when it happens but bring a pleasant disposition when it’s not. They got stuck in and did a great job.

The two musketeers became three, when the “pruning whirlwind”, Sai Kham Lu joined in to help. Romain and Benoit worked hard but Sai is a Cambodian pruning machine. To describe him as productive doesn’t do him justice. In more than 30 years pruning experience, he is the only person we have seen who works with a miner’s light. This is no exaggeration. He happily racked up 16 hour days and anyone who follows day length at that time of year will know he spent many hours working in the dark and still did an excellent job.

In the great Grande Armee tradition of the “maraud”, Romain and Benoit busied themselves around the southwest, looking for company and sustenance. This has taken them far afield, to exotic destinations like Manjimup, where they have brought some Gallic flair to driving, eating and romance. They’ve moved on to conquer Japan and we wish them all the best.