Blake - Haswell Colorado

On Wednesday 2 July, four of us left the main crew in Scott City Kansas to pick up an extra contract in Haswell Colorado, in the state’s south-east. We’ve got about two thousand acres to cut which would usually take about a week, but the area we’re in has been in a drought for the last couple of years, making the wheat really thin and short. The combines can run at twice the speed so essentially we’re making some easy money on the side before we reunite with the rest of the crew in northern Colorado.

The trip up was about 120 miles. When we arrived in Haswell I discovered that one of my tires was flat. Haswell is similar to Isabel Kansas; pretty much the only businesses left are the post office, the farmers’ co-op and a tiny fuel station.

The workshop at the fuel station was unmanned when we arrived, but the mechanic’s wife, who was looking after the store, arranged for her husband to meet us. He told us to get a head start on the tire before he arrived. We opened up the garage and started getting some tools out when the mechanic’s seven-year-old son and five-year-old daughter, turned up in a little golf buggy.

Blake was wearing a Orange County Choppers bandana, an aviator jacket over a checked shirt, ripped blue jeans and cowboy boots. You could tell straight away that he was a confident little kid. He parked the cart, ripped off his jacket, threw it on the ground and got straight to work on my tire.

We couldn’t find the right sized socket for the nuts on my wheel, but Blake was desperate to get the air gun running no matter what size the socket. When he couldn’t find the socket, he got under my truck with a jack and before we knew it he had my tire off the ground.

The older guy in the video is Ron from New Zealand and the younger guy with the cap is Steve from south-west NSW. After we changed the tire, he took me for a ride around the lot on the golf buggy which I also videoed - I'll put it up shortly.