My favourite part of the day was the chicken watch, mid-afternoon and usually sunny and warm. I was volunteering on a farm in Italy as a ‘workaway’, and one of my jobs was letting the chickens out for their daily run and getting them back safely into the coop. The chicken coop was in the middle of the vines, so I’d bring a book, sit on a bench in the afternoon sun, and listen to the happy clucking as the hens made the most of their hour of freedom.
‘Workaway’ is a platform for linking volunteers with hosts offering accommodation and food in exchange for work. There are hosts all over the world. I had always assumed that this was for young ones travelling the world, and was surprised and delighted to discover that there is a ‘mature traveller’ option to click.
When I turned 60, I had a strong urge to ease out of my comfort zone and do something different. Browsing the Workaway site felt like a portal into thousands of other lives, with endless possibilities. I chose a self-sufficient farm in Lazio, an hour from Rome, and sent a message to Shak, the owner, who accepted my request to come and stay with him. Before I knew it, I was standing outside a train station in rural Italy, waiting to be picked up by a complete stranger.
If that sounds a bit freaky, it isn’t really. The Workaway hosts all have a verified profile, with reviews from previous workawayers. It was possible to contact other guests who had stayed there and get their views, so I felt perfectly safe, if a bit apprehensive going to live for a few weeks with people I had never met. Of course, that was one of the best things about the experience. This type of travel attracts all kinds of people: students and young people travelling cheaply, digital nomads looking for a different environment in which to work remotely, people wishing to learn a language or a new skill, and aul’ ones, like me, looking for a secure way to travel solo.
My typical day at Shak’s farm started at eight with baking the bread we had started the day before. We made a kind of sourdough, but used some yeast from the wine fermenting in the cellar. After breakfast of warm bread, coffee, homemade jam and peanut butter, we headed off to do our various jobs. As a workaway, you’re expected to do four or five hours work a day in return for board and lodgings. The farm had grape vines, olive trees, a ‘food forest’ being planted, a vegetable garden and chickens, dogs and cats. My job was pruning the olive trees and carting the prunings up to the compost heap. Rewarding work, though physical, in the middle of beautiful countryside up and down slopes, the hilltop village of Magliano-Sabina visible across a tree-filled valley. We took turns at making lunch with Shak, who was an excellent cook. Fresh vegetables from the garden were made into risotto, pasta dishes, or ‘torta rustica’, one of Shak’s favourites, a pie made with filo pastry and whatever vegetables were to hand. Glasses of his own wine, of course, accompanied every meal. Well, except breakfast. In the afternoon we were free, apart from some ‘household chores’, like scooping algae out of the eco pool, or as mentioned, hanging out with the chickens. At six, we met at the ‘sunset bar’, so called, as it was the last part of the farm to catch the evening sun. Here, we’d have a beer before dinner, and play a few tunes. Shak was a musician, and it was no coincidence that many of the workawayers came with an instrument under their oxter. He spotted any musical references in peoples’ profiles, so we had an American harmonica player, a Hungarian opera singer, an Italian traditional guitar player, Shak on Ukelele, and all of us with voices to sing along.
We made and ate dinner together, and as everyone took turns cooking, we had culinary influences from all over the world.
On our days off, we’d explore the local area, take the train to Rome, or Shak would bring us to one of the many village festivals in the region.
This was my first workaway, and I’m heading off soon on another.
There’s something very freeing about not knowing exactly what to expect. Signing up for a workaway, you have to be prepared to be flexible, to do what’s needed on any given day, to spend time with a variety of people of all ages, and from all walks of life. You have to accept that it might not all be perfect. There can be unexpected challenges – I had to get used to a composting loo last time – but that’s all part of the adventure. Different from a holiday, workaway allows you to immerse yourself fully in the culture of the place, and to follow your curiosity into another way of living.
Details from workaway.info
