Carin ready for work

Where to start when you are a journalist and a writer and somebody asks you to write an article for The Accipiter; the famous online-magazine of The Hawk Conservancy Trust? Maybe by apologizing for my bad English, because I am Dutch? Or by telling you that I have no clue were to start, because so many volunteers wrote already about what we all doing in the park? Maybe I shall start at the beginning?

How on earth did I end up at the park being a volunteer for my three weeks holiday? No, I’m not crazy, although … It’s more like a fairytale or maybe better, a love story. It started about five years ago when I visited The Hawk Conservancy when I was on a holiday. I don’t know what happened. I am very romantic, but never believed in love at first sight until I walked up the park to see my first 2 o’clock display. It was grey, but dry and we were late. No, Ashley didn’t tell the story about how his father treated people when they are late; otherwise I might never have come back. Ashley was just himself going on about his favourite subjects: birds of prey!

It was an odd holiday for me. I found out that my husband was a stranger to me, but we try to make the best of it. I forced him to go back to The Hawk Conservancy at the end of the holiday and made all the arrangements to write a page about the park for the newspapers I worked for. I came back on my own a couple of months later to think about my marriage and brought back the paper for Keith, the webmaster with whom I became friends.

I decided to end my marriage because I was unhappy and everything in my life changed, but not my love for that beautiful place in England. I tried to come over at least once a year and sometimes even more. I did activity days, brought my best friend with me one time and understand that people started to recognize me when I came back.

Always impressive... one of our bald eagles

The displays are always great to see, but when you come over so often and don’t have company with you to spend some time with, you started to get bored and there is just one solution; start with doing some volunteer work … and I did. Last year I came over in September and painted nest boxes. The weather was great, I had my own spot in the park where I was working and I watched almost every display with my buddy the photo camera.

It was like a dream and I didn’t want to go, but my life is here in the Netherlands where I am writing this piece. I knew again I had to come back. In March I paid a short visit to see all the changes and to reveal my plan to come and work as a volunteer in my holiday. Shortly after I even applied for a job, but I have a lack of experience. It’s not as easy to fly a bird in Holland as in England and I don’t want to. These beautiful animals should fly free in the air, that’s why I love them so much and envy them.

Carin preparing food in the hospital

So … in the ‘summer’ I came over to do some volunteers work and instead of calling my own shots I had to listen to the falconer who I was attend to. She or he was telling me what to do. I cleaned, what normally isn’t my thing, I weeded, I broomed, I shovelled, weeded again, rake grass, weeded again, painted, did some sh*tty business and weeded again. The weather was lousy, in between some sunny spells. The company was good. I had great laughs, didn’t had to go to the sport school to get a workout and I really loved almost every second of my holiday. I love it so much, that I have to come back, I’m sorry …

My favourite spot

My highlights? Seeing the progress of the baby birds in the hospital I think. My best place? Will always be the meadow, where my love story started. Unbelievable to be there in the morning in the early sun. I hope to be there at dusk or dawn sometime … My wish? To learn how to handle birds so I can promote and do less weeding. The strangest things? English lunch with snacks and chocolate. Funny story? Is about the many “thank you’s” you hear. I had the privilege to call Thruxton once and read exactly what was on the paper. I was stunned to hear Ludovic, a French work experience student correct me, because I didn’t say thank you after every sentence. It wasn’t on the paper, but he was right and I embarrassed … I now hear myself saying an awful lot of ‘Dank je wel’, Dutch for thank you. I could go on and on and on about The Hawk Conservancy, but I will stop here with saying a big DANK JE WEL to everybody I had the pleasure to work with during my stay.

I hope to visit the park again soon. I am thinking about having a sabbatical and move to England for a year. Bless me … I hope you never fall in love like me, unless it’s mutual and maybe it someday will be for me …