Bye bye March!!
Having reached, unscathed, the final day of March without having had their ears boxed by mad March hares, been blown off their feet by strong equinoctial gales or narrowly missed tree planting overload, the NCVs were glad to hear that there would be a reasonable task this week to finish off the month. They were going to continue work on laying the hedge at the Grewelthorpe pond entrance to Hackfall Woods, so not far to walk!
However - on arrival it was made clear that the majority of the group would need to make the journey deep down into the woods to sort out a missing piece of path that had been taken out by a falling tree.
This involved a veeeery loooong
and extremely muddy walk
carrying all the tools and wood.
Once there, stone was harvested from
above the path .....
....and from within the roots of the tree.
These were used to pack up the
boards that had been pegged into place.
Earth was removed to widen
and flatten the walkway....
...and other stones used
to create a crazy paved surface.
Steps were built for walkers to use to
move easily from one level to another.
A broken board walk was utilised...
...to provide additional wooden planking.
The steps looked very
professional upon completion.
Paul kindly provided a box of Tiffin
to boost energy levels.
Thanks Paul!
Meanwhile - back up at the Grewelthorpe
Pond entrance, 4 of the gang
were getting on with the hedge laying job.
The Boss sat down on the job.
They thoroughly enjoyed their
breaks in the sunshine....
....and made some excellent progress too!
As a little aside - the ROW team were out last Thursday (26th March) in order to repair some waymarkers at Low Riggs Farm up at Stean. Here they are in action...
New ROW volunteer, Richard,
got busy with the giant tweezers
in order to dig a hole 18" deep.
Then he and Ken inserted
the first new post...
...and set it in place with half
a bag of quick setting
post crete.
Then all that was needed
were some marker arrows.
Post number 2 was given
the same treatment
further uphill.
This one just needed
clearing of hazel branches.
Unfortunately there were some
very muddy patches.
Never mind. Amy got busy with
a spade and dug trenches.
Richard and Liz started making
mud pies too.
Down at the bottom of the valley
the tweezers were deployed
again.
This time for the insertion
of a new gatepost.
There you are - we just needed
to hang the gate onto it once
the post crete was dry.
A group of young 'stirks' came across to
ask if they could help in any way.
Right back up at High Riggs
there was just this information
post to re-insert.
The ladies team worked
on this. Unfortunately there was a huge
piece of rock a foot down.
It was EXTREMELY difficult
to remove but they were not
to be beaten!!
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