Forget the OE, Kiwis pick DE

The kids are gone, and you’re bored with your home and job. Meet the Kiwi couples replacing their OE with a DE – the stay-at home working holiday. Nadine Porter reports.

Forget the big OE. Some Kiwi couples are now choosing the stay-at-home version of the working holiday – the DE (domestic experience).

Wendy and John Critchley, aged 47 and 48, have left their home, jobs and possessions behind in favour of the open road and the promise of different jobs every month.

Based in Alexandra since December, the couple have been working on a dairy farm but they have a wealth of skills they hope to utilise on the road – especially Wendy’s experience as a chef and John’s in painting and decorating.

Wendy Critchley does not find the idea of spending the next decade in one job and in one place alluring. ‘‘We’ve always had itchy feet.’’ The couple are now living in a caravan and will begin two years of working around New Zealand in June.

They will first housesit in Oxford for two months, looking after two retired equestrian horses.

Then they will move to a dairy farm in Culverden for 10 weeks. Wendy will help with calving and John with general farm work. After that, they plan to assist friends who own a kayak guiding business in Golden Bay before fruit picking in the area.

Next winter, they hope to journey through the North Island.

Wendy caught the travel bug four years ago after her father passed away from cancer. A lifelong farmer, her dad retired in his early 70s and died six months later.

‘‘He said, ‘All my life I’ve worked so hard and saved all my money’, and for what?’’

Wendy sees little point in waiting so long herself. ‘‘Half the time when you retire you’re too old to do anything, and you can get sick and die. So we want to enjoy life before we get to retirement age.’’

She describes the minimalist lifestyle as ‘‘freeing’’. The couple are aiming to make enough money to live on and keep an emergency fund. If necessary, they could quit their lifestyle and manage another dairy farm.

But they still hold out hope of doing a true OE, in the United Kingdom, where John was born, in future. ‘‘Some people need the security of a house,’’ Wendy says, ‘‘But we want to pack up and just go where we want.’’

Colin and Jo Todd, aged 60 and 50, have been saving $1000 a week while working in Central Otago picking cherries and harvesting grapes.

Last August, they rented out their Marton home and headed south. In just eight weeks over the cherry season, they saved $12,500.

After each block of work, they took their motorhome and holidayed for up to three weeks.

They save half of the $500-week rent they receive from their home. And with little room for extra items in their motorhome, the couple are finding their lifestyle change highly lucrative.

The couple spent two years preparing for their trip. Colin believes that time was essential in helping them to work out what they required to live on the road.

He says they have met other couples choosing to do a working holiday and some had become close friends.

Now the couple have fallen in love with Central Otago, and have decided to stay there for a second cherry and grape harvesting season. Colin hasn’t ruled out travelling down every summer once he retires. ‘‘It’s just such an amazing, wonderful place.’’

Grape Vision owner James Dicey says some viticulture tasks suit middle-aged nomads.

The Cromwell company develops and manages vineyards, hiring up to 15 permanent vineyard staff and up to 150 employees during the critical harvest phase – including some seasonal Pacific Island employees.

Dicey confirms that he is seeing more domestic labour mobility and has been ‘‘pleasantly surprised’’ that he had secured experienced tractor drivers from the dairy industry.

Kiwis, he says, are important at harvest time, and he welcomes the idea of more couples like the Todds on working holidays.

‘‘Half the time when you retire you’re too old to do anything, and you can get sick and die. So we want to enjoy life before we get to retirement age.’’

Wendy Critchley