Palm bay hideaway resort

- August 15, 2013

We have been working at a new helpx job for the past two weeks. We arrived in Long Island (20 minutes ferry ride from Airlie Beach) on the 6th and will be leaving on the 18th. Here is the job description.

Palm Bay Hideaway was previously a 5 star resort managed by the "Peppers" group.
It was closed in early 2010 after Cyclone Yats.
The owners of the beachfront Bungalows are re-opening the resort and there is much work to be done to make it suitable for resort operation.
We are after helpers who are willing to put in 4 hours each day cleaning, gardening and doing minor maintenance work in exchange for free accommodation on a spectacular Whitsunday resort island.
We understand that you are here to experience the Whitsundays and Great Barrier reef so you will only work 5 days out of every 7, and you can nominate which days you have free.
Your accommodation will be in the resort staff quarters which has both double and single rooms available with shared bathrooms and toilets(some rooms have an en-suite bathroom)
Linen, towels and blankets are provided in your room and you will share the community kitchen.
This is equipped with BBQs, gas burners, hot plates, microwave, toaster, refrigerator, freezer, crockery, cutlery and cookware.
Because we operate as a BYO, you will also need to bring your own food.
I suggest you purchase your food at the Whitsunday Shopping Centre in Cannonvale before your ferry transfer to Long Island - and bring enough for your first week or more.
The resort has a small shop which sells basic groceries, frozen food and drinks and you will have staff discount of 25% on all items purchased except drinks.
Transfers to Long Island are by ferry from Shute Harbour and the fare is $32pp one way.
Once you are at the resort you will qualify for a 50% staff discount on ferry travel to the mainland - $16 per person each way.

This is by far the best helpx job I have taken so far. The location of the resort is unbelievable. The only ways to get to the resort are either by water taxi ($40 a person. yikes), have you own sailboat (1 billion dollars), or a ferry ($32 a person one way) but would have to walk about half a mile from where the ferry drops you off with your own groceries.

Basically, the resort is very remote and isolated which is awesome. I haven't heard a car running for over a week. Haven't seen 15 or more people at a time for over a week. It's been great. I bought a week worth of food coming here so we don't have to go back to the mainland. If I need to go buy groceries, it would literally take a full day just to do that since we are on an island.

The best thing about this place is since it is a resort, a lot of guests that stays here also need to buy their own food to prepare and most likely they will purchase food that backpackers would not be able to afford. The majority of the time, they leave with leftovers and we backpackers get to use them. So far, I have gotten a free T-bone steak, tons of vegetables, a variety of different dips sauce, tons of vegetables, and spices. ALL FOR FREE!!!

The work has been extremely easy. Kitchening cleaning, painting, laundry, room cleaning..etc. For 4 hours a day of easy work, I get to stay at a formerly 5 star resort. What a life.

I could definitely stay here until the end of the month easily but booked a diving tour to go out to the Great Barrier Reefs for the 22nd. That's a few days of driving from here. Totally going to miss this place and the friends I've met here.

There is a Reef Festival back in the mainland this up coming weekend. A music festival with musical guest Timomatic and fireworks. No idea who he is but I think he is making it pretty big here in Aussie, as well as in the states. Should be a good time.