Post: #1

I'm looking for ideas on how/where to spend my days off for a new position I'm taking. I've been working in the oil industry for several years now and will be taking my first equal rotation off-shore job next month. I'll be getting a raise and working 1/3rd less the time, (28/28 rotation) and will have flights paid to my point of origin (worth around $1500/month), or can use the money to fly somewhere else.

I've vacationed/travelled to Italy, Poland, Amsterdam, Australia, Thailand, Burma, some other places and haven't had a home essentially for the last several years because of my erratic work schedule, I've spent a LOT of time in hotels. I am interested in learning a new language and not traveling to party all the time but more or less living somewhere new where the low Canadian dollar still goes somewhere, working on game, gym and the sort.

Has anyone been in a similar position? Any starting points you can offer for me to consider?

Also, here is a list of countries myself (and other younger Canadian citizens can work in for 1-2 yrs) http://www.international.gc.ca/experienc...x?lang=eng It would be great to go and work in the other country as well on my days off, not so much for the money but local connections, social circle and language. This would most likely be a bar job?

Post: #2

/thread-9826.html
Try this thread a lot of people who have worked oil jobs.

Other threads also if you try a search.

Good luck!

Post: #3

My father did this for about 20 years while I was growing up. For his month off he came home (of course).

My cousin does this rotation at the moment and he does Kiev in the warmer months and Bangkok in the cooler months. He keeps an apt in Bangkok and lets a girl stay there for free as long as she keeps it clean, cooks for him, and has cold beer waiting when he flies in.

She may or may not be a hooker.

Post: #4

IMO the 28/28 rotation is perfect. Some jobs I've seen even pay your wage in full on your 28 days off and tax free. Insane. Good job man.

Post: #5

(03-24-2014 09:05 PM)samsamsam Wrote:  /thread-9826.html
Try this thread a lot of people who have worked oil jobs.

Other threads also if you try a search.

Good luck!

Right, quite a lot of information in that thread. I'm leaving the Alberta job market though for the UK, most of what I've seen in that long thread is in regards to coming to Alberta and getting started in the industry. I've spent some time looking for rotation threads but haven't come up with much, maybe I'm using the wrong terms.

Thanks for the responses guys. I'm pretty excited to have lined this up and need to get a better plan put together for that time off. I hope some of the guys getting started in the oil patch can take a look at this and see what types of opportunities open up once you stick with it for a while and work your ass off to build a good reputation.

Edit: Found this thread /thread-24857.html similar.

Post: #6

how can I get this job?

I will do anything.

british guy, 27.

Post: #7

That's pretty much the ideal rotation for a single guy. 28/28 is a very sweet deal. 7/7 is the most brutal. Can't do anything with just 7 days off other than recover.

So you are working in the UK (North Sea?) and your employer will fly you to/from Canada or another location of your choice every rotation? That's a great deal. $1,500 will get you to/from most places in the world ex London. Exceptions are probably Aus/NZ the South Pacific and Hawaii. The rest of the world would likely be doable at that fare as long as you plan ahead, fly economy and try to avoid Christmas/New Year and mid Summer.

As for where to go. Why not choose 6 different places, one on each inhabited continent? That would give you about a year's worth of work and travel. My choices would be

North America: New York
Europe: Paris
South America: Rio
Africa: Cape Town
Asia: Hong Kong or Shanghai
Australia: Sailing the Great Barrier Reef.

Hong Kong and Australia would be the only places you could work according to the FAT Canada, but there are always more options than highlighted. For example I encounter many first world travelers working in South Africa. Usually in unpaid make-work internship type jobs, but occasionally paid work as well. Actually had a Canadian waitress from Nova Scotia the other day. So it is possible. You won't be making much money though. If I were you I'd forget about working since you are likely making enough at your oil job, and connect with ordinary people in other ways. Working for money is going to be difficult since you can only commit for a few weeks at a time.

Post: #8

Come to Norwegian sector and join us working 14/28 instead

I´m considering apartment in Poland somewhere.

Post: #9

(03-25-2014 04:33 AM)2014 Wrote:  how can I get this job?

I will do anything.

british guy, 27.

Best bet is to check out RGU or Dundee and get into a technical program or better yet petroleum engineering. The job placement and prospects are unreal. Possible to get in as a hand for the rigs but you would still have to get safety certifications, I'm not too sure how to go about that route though. I recommend searching for job fairs in Aberdeen, beefing up your resume (look for comparables in the industry online, see whats in demand and cater it towards that).

@Hussar, thanks for the great ideas man. You must be land based with a 7/7 rotation? I'll be in the UK North sea, right. The flight deal is a good setup and want to take advantage of it, some people hate those long hauls but I've been into that for about 4 years now and still get excited every time (and very drunk). I'm going to give your post some more thought because to this point I haven't thought about every continent. I'd like to work on my game and going to a new place every hitch would be a great way to force myself into this. Whenever I've not stayed in a hotel I've used AirBnb so I'll need to get on and see how to go about getting a place and the works. My thought with the job was just that it would be a natural transition to meeting new people and chicks without knowing the languages but I'm sure there's lots of ways to go about this.

(03-25-2014 12:02 PM)pants Wrote:  Come to Norwegian sector and join us working 14/28 instead

I´m considering apartment in Poland somewhere.

That's the end goal right there for my time in this industry. Is it necessary to speak Norwegian to be taken seriously? I always hear about how hard up they are for qualified staff, however, I heard that 14/28 was only for Norwegian citizens tho and expats were looking at 28/28.

I was in Sopot in November with some Norwegian guys and had a killer time and am considering spending the summer in different cities there, also went to Warsaw which is a complete pass, Sopot might be too packed with tourists for what I'm after in the summer tho. Had an amazing time tho.

Post: #10

No it´s not only for for norwegians. They are popular jobs no doubt, but with the right mindset, right connections and the right skill, its defiantly possible for foreigners. in my division we are more foreigners than norwegians. The guy living the furthest away is from Canada. Else there are many people from around europe.

If you work among the service companies its easier to be a foreigner as they are much more multinational. Among the rig-crew

Post: #11

(03-25-2014 02:32 PM)CKSEA Wrote:  ...

@Hussar, thanks for the great ideas man. You must be land based with a 7/7 rotation? I'll be in the UK North sea, right. The flight deal is a good setup and want to take advantage of it, some people hate those long hauls but I've been into that for about 4 years now and still get excited every time (and very drunk). I'm going to give your post some more thought because to this point I haven't thought about every continent. I'd like to work on my game and going to a new place every hitch would be a great way to force myself into this. Whenever I've not stayed in a hotel I've used AirBnb so I'll need to get on and see how to go about getting a place and the works. My thought with the job was just that it would be a natural transition to meeting new people and chicks without knowing the languages but I'm sure there's lots of ways to go about this.

...

No, I'm not on 7/7. Since I have my own business, and it's very volatile, more like 28/0 sometimes, and 0/28 other times. I do have a good friend who works 7/7 in Fort Mac though. I think he's insane and am always encouraging him to look for a better rotation.

At least in South Africa you may want to consider hostels if travelling around. Hostels get a bad rap on this forum, but in many places this is where young single tourists stay. Especially out of the big cities. 95+% of people staying in a fancy hotel will be business travellers (mostly men), couples and the odd family. They're not usually a good deal for singles. They'll be OK in a big city like Cape Town since you can game in the bars clubs, beaches malls etc,, but in more remote areas the action is usually at backpackers hostels. They will also typically have a bar that is also frequented by locals so don't think you'll be in a complete tourist bubble.

Post: #12

Hey man,

What do you do in the oil industry? I just moved to Alberta for my masters. I've worked in mining for years; mostly in northern BC, Yukon and NWT. I'm pretty familiar with the lifestyle.

Are you into riding at all? A motorcycle trip is a pretty good way to spend a month.

Post: #13

My role is a mud man (Drilling Fluids Engineer). One unique aspect of my situation is that I'm completely location independent and went to Alberta entirely for work and would mostly leave on all my time off as soon as I could afford it.

Right now I'm thinking about what I'd like to accomplish on my time off and things that I'm considering are: preferably stay in one place, learning another language (Spanish), working out as much as possible, learning to kiteboard or surf, playing golf and the guitar, and being in the sun as much as possible. So with them paying for the flights to virtually anywhere all options are open for the next year.

(04-04-2014 07:01 PM)cmrocks Wrote:  Hey man,

What do you do in the oil industry? I just moved to Alberta for my masters. I've worked in mining for years; mostly in northern BC, Yukon and NWT. I'm pretty familiar with the lifestyle.

Are you into riding at all? A motorcycle trip is a pretty good way to spend a month.

Post: #14

So, im interested in drill fluid engineering. Did you go to mud school? Im working for a very good service company in frac now. Im the fra? fluids guy. They are spinning me up on all the engineering side now. I have been trying to find a good mudschool, im willing to even pay my own way if need be. Id like to get closer to the rig eventually as a tech guy, though I love frac so far.


As for countries that you should go to on your time off, tell us what ur looking for. Type of girls you like? culture ect. Im on my way to Colombia as we speak. Im on off rotation now.

(04-14-2014 04:21 PM)CKSEA Wrote:  My role is a mud man (Drilling Fluids Engineer). One unique aspect of my situation is that I'm completely location independent and went to Alberta entirely for work and would mostly leave on all my time off as soon as I could afford it.

Right now I'm thinking about what I'd like to accomplish on my time off and things that I'm considering are: preferably stay in one place, learning another language (Spanish), working out as much as possible, learning to kiteboard or surf, playing golf and the guitar, and being in the sun as much as possible. So with them paying for the flights to virtually anywhere all options are open for the next year.

(04-04-2014 07:01 PM)cmrocks Wrote:  Hey man,

What do you do in the oil industry? I just moved to Alberta for my masters. I've worked in mining for years; mostly in northern BC, Yukon and NWT. I'm pretty familiar with the lifestyle.

Are you into riding at all? A motorcycle trip is a pretty good way to spend a month.

Post: #15

Yes, I work for a major service company and was hired and immediately sent to mud school. Curious why you'd want to make the switch from frac to mud if they're throwing all that interest and training at you? The big money in mud if you stick with it comes from consulting after 5+ yrs experience. Wouldn't you make a good completions consultant with all that frac exposure too in less time than it would take to get going in the mud game?

I'm interested in learning Spanish so have been considering Mexico so far, ideally a low key beach area is what I'm after.

(04-15-2014 11:59 AM)elabayarde Wrote:  So, im interested in drill fluid engineering. Did you go to mud school? Im working for a very good service company in frac now. Im the fra? fluids guy. They are spinning me up on all the engineering side now. I have been trying to find a good mudschool, im willing to even pay my own way if need be. Id like to get closer to the rig eventually as a tech guy, though I love frac so far.


As for countries that you should go to on your time off, tell us what ur looking for. Type of girls you like? culture ect. Im on my way to Colombia as we speak. Im on off rotation now.

Post: #16

(04-17-2014 03:06 PM)CKSEA Wrote:  Yes, I work for a major service company and was hired and immediately sent to mud school. Curious why you'd want to make the switch from frac to mud if they're throwing all that interest and training at you? The big money in mud if you stick with it comes from consulting after 5+ yrs experience. Wouldn't you make a good completions consultant with all that frac exposure too in less time than it would take to get going in the mud game?

I'm interested in learning Spanish so have been considering Mexico so far, ideally a low key beach area is what I'm after.

(04-15-2014 11:59 AM)elabayarde Wrote:  So, im interested in drill fluid engineering. Did you go to mud school? Im working for a very good service company in frac now. Im the fra? fluids guy. They are spinning me up on all the engineering side now. I have been trying to find a good mudschool, im willing to even pay my own way if need be. Id like to get closer to the rig eventually as a tech guy, though I love frac so far.


As for countries that you should go to on your time off, tell us what ur looking for. Type of girls you like? culture ect. Im on my way to Colombia as we speak. Im on off rotation now.

You know, I honestly don't know, Ive heard of guys becoming consultants after 3 years of full up engineering experience. But Im so new to this, its still hard to tell whats the end goal/progression. Also frac rotations suck and everyone is getting worse. 14 on/7 off and theyare starting to ask for more. Working on the rig seems to give a more balanced rotation.

Post: #17

(03-24-2014 07:24 PM)CKSEA Wrote:  It would be great to go and work in the other country as well on my days off, not so much for the money but local connections, social circle and language. This would most likely be a bar job?

If you stay in an emerging market country, look for a private language school. Usually they have a lot of students who want to speak with native English speakers. The pay will probably be low, so you might be better off doing it for free to avoid responsibility and legal issues (work permits, etc). Those schools usually have a few native speakers working as teachers, so you may find an American/Canadian wingman there too.
Anyway, that's what I did when I first hit Ukraine years ago. I did it for free because the money they could offer at the time wasn't really worth anything I wasn't qualified, didn't have any teaching experience, and was only interested in English-speaking girls, not teaching. The other segment they cater for is business people learning English, so you can get some good local connections.

Not sure about visas, but since you'll be there only half of the year, you can probably use tourist visas or visa-free. You can get a quick overview on wikipedia and then research more from there: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_requir...n_citizens

Post: #18

im in Colombia, I highly recommend it. ill explain more later.

Post: #19

Time for an update on this as I'm almost halfway through my initial agreement. Things have been going OK, great sometimes, never bad.

During this time I have visited, in no particular order, London, Edinburgh, Inverness, Copenhagen, Berlin, Wrocław, Krakow, Brno, Prague, Canaries, a couple places in MX as well as several frequent destinations for me in the US. I have a lot of airmiles.

I briefly tried a hostel in Copenhagen but was there during a week long heatwave and lasted 3 nights out of a six day booking before the smell got to me and I switched cities and checked into my normal accommodation, nice hotels. Other than that intense sweat-humid smell we all hate to admit we know, the hostel was great for meeting people and a good experience.

Tinder has been great so far but I need to work on my reasoning/explanation for being in the places I go to. I haven't had as many opportunities/felt comfortable enough about my situation at these destinations to try much daygame so can't really comment on that front. I don't have an issue with daygame or approaching, but am going from destination to destination and often don't have my head on right when I'm in a city for 4-5 days, drinking, thinking about what's next. This is much easier to explain as to why you are in the Canaries vs. Wrocław or Brno destinations. I've been getting laid, but nothing to write home about.

Right now I'm thinking about what to do after this contract, options are to extend, return to Canada, or switch to a new country. If anyone read this and is in a similar situation to what I came from in Canada (working long hours in the bush/oil field towns for around 20 days a month with meatheads and busted chicks) I definitely recommend an offshore/international rotation. I work at least a third less and my pay year on year will increase by at least 25%.

So, now we are in November in Europe. I've made plans for the holiday season which takes me to January as the next 2-3 week chunk of time off. I know now that I want to avoid 2-3 weeks travelling city to city staying in hotels and am deciding on a city to finish out this contract in for my days off. My easiest pick is Edinburgh as I've been a couple times, have a few friends there and have had great, albeit expensive, times there. My rent will be about 2K CAD a month for a 1 bedroom in the right area. It's about half a million people and logistically I can stay in the city centre and be in the middle of it all.

Can anyone recommend other cities to consider based on your experience? Anywhere in Europe really I'm open to considering.

If I stay in Edinburgh I'll spend a lot of time hosting friends/family and seeing different parts of the country, really a beautiful, but expensive, place. I'm also very interested in learning Spanish or French but as I've only been to the Canaries it would be a big shot in the dark to pick a city, so maybe will need to do another city to city tour if I go that route. On the less expensive side, Poland has also been great for me, especially in Sopot, so Polish wouldn't be bad to learn either. I'm disappointed I haven't been to Ukraine (Lviv) or the Baltics yet.

Post: #20

Anyone have any more insight in how to pull off this lifestyle? I am American but currently live in Norway studying a Russian degree having taught myself Norwegian for the free education, but I'm starting to wonder if this is a dead-end career-wise and looking at alternatives.

My friend who has a Norwegian mother recently got an apprenticeship on a ship working 4 weeks on 4 weeks off but apparently you need to be a Norwegian citizen to get the apprenticeship..anyone got any ideas of how to break into a job where we can live this lifestyle? From what I understand it is basically possible to work half of your life and the other half travel freely with two months of pay dosposable income for each off period, sounds like a dream come true to a wanderer like me. Would really appreciate any ideas or feedback.

Post: #21

Oil industry is probably the best for these jobs, its what I do, I recently left a 14/14 job in Alberta and am about to get a job offshore where the rotation will be 21/21. Something that a lot of guys don't consider is how long a month actually is when you're working 12 hours per day and living in an isolated work camp or rig, it fucking sucks! Also, a month off is a long time and you have to manage your money well, many guys don't, a month is a long time to party and travel.

Post: #22

(10-18-2016 03:25 AM)scotian Wrote:  Oil industry is probably the best for these jobs, its what I do, I recently left a 14/14 job in Alberta and am about to get a job offshore where the rotation will be 21/21. Something that a lot of guys don't consider is how long a month actually is when you're working 12 hours per day and living in an isolated work camp or rig, it fucking sucks! Also, a month off is a long time and you have to manage your money well, many guys don't, a month is a long time to party and travel.

Try 120 days on for 12 hours per day in isolation surrounded by a worse crowd than the oil patch. I'm really starting to hate the maritime sector.

Can't complain about 120 days off though -_-

Post: #23

(10-18-2016 09:07 PM)Jnx Wrote:  

(10-18-2016 03:25 AM)scotian Wrote:  Oil industry is probably the best for these jobs, its what I do, I recently left a 14/14 job in Alberta and am about to get a job offshore where the rotation will be 21/21. Something that a lot of guys don't consider is how long a month actually is when you're working 12 hours per day and living in an isolated work camp or rig, it fucking sucks! Also, a month off is a long time and you have to manage your money well, many guys don't, a month is a long time to party and travel.

Try 120 days on for 12 hours per day in isolation surrounded by a worse crowd than the oil patch. I'm really starting to hate the maritime sector.

Can't complain about 120 days off though -_-

Fuck, I'd probably go insane, are you on the boat the entire time?

So I had a job interview yesterday and when I asked about the rotation the manager said "well, its supposed to be 21/21 but we've been so busy lately that the guys have been on 21/7, legally we can't keep you offshore for more than 21 days." Its so typical, those fuckers would leave you out there for a year if they could haha, that's been the down side of my career in the oil patch, they have a hard time finding qualified guys who are willing to work in shitty conditions so when they do find the right guys, the work them to the bone. I'm still thinking about this job, I'll probably take it just because I've never worked offshore and the experience would be interesting, I'm looking forward to the helicopter ride.

Post: #24

Try this thread, good info for getting into the Maritime industry:

/thread-41852.html

American Jesus Wrote:Anyone have any more insight in how to pull off this lifestyle? I am American but currently live in Norway studying a Russian degree having taught myself Norwegian for the free education, but I'm starting to wonder if this is a dead-end career-wise and looking at alternatives.

My friend who has a Norwegian mother recently got an apprenticeship on a ship working 4 weeks on 4 weeks off but apparently you need to be a Norwegian citizen to get the apprenticeship..anyone got any ideas of how to break into a job where we can live this lifestyle? From what I understand it is basically possible to work half of your life and the other half travel freely with two months of pay dosposable income for each off period, sounds like a dream come true to a wanderer like me. Would really appreciate any ideas or feedback.

Post: #25

(10-18-2016 03:25 AM)scotian Wrote:  Oil industry is probably the best for these jobs, its what I do, I recently left a 14/14 job in Alberta and am about to get a job offshore where the rotation will be 21/21. Something that a lot of guys don't consider is how long a month actually is when you're working 12 hours per day and living in an isolated work camp or rig, it fucking sucks! Also, a month off is a long time and you have to manage your money well, many guys don't, a month is a long time to party and travel.

scotian's gonna become a rig pig........

Do you need to do the helicopter survival training, like in the North Sea?



Edit: not tryin to put shitters up you, was meaning it was a fun training course compared to some.