My whole body aches. Today was the first day of Olive harvesting. I have spend a few days in the last couple of weeks, collecting fallen olives after we had very high winds, which is very easy going. But today, today was all about using muscles I have not used in a long time and straining my neck to see if there are many olives left in the trees.
The trees on the land are huge, so majestic. I love that they tower over me, giving me shade and shelter. But come the olive season, I get why so many people don't like to work here. It's real hard work, you really have to stretch a lot and climb the trees in order to harvest them.
I work with a woman who has been harvesting these tree's for the last 15 years and today she told me, 'Aishlinn only the hard core come to work here, you will find no gentle angels'. I have had an olive in the eye and lots of tiny olive particles in both my eyes, as well as numerous cuts from using the canar to harvest the olives.
But my hands feel so soft, after handling the olives and although I feel exhausted, I feel very satisfied. When I am out there, twisting my body and using the full force of it, I feel so alive. I don't particularly like hitting the branches to get the olives off, so I always give my apologies before I start and after I finish.
Not bad for one days work. There's quite a few litres there and by the end of next week, I hope to have made about 25 litres for myself.
It feels so good to be doing full on physical work, once I got past the first half hour of pain that is. My arms are really not used to whacking things at such a great high, as it only happens once a year and my legs are really letting me know, that they have been worked hard today. I know, that I will sleep really well tonight!
I've got 4 more days of this and by the end of it, I will be picking them in my sleep. But because these trees have been left untouched and are so old, the oil is exquisite, which make all the aches, worth it!