I said in the last blog entry for the work on the leat (Fri. 20 Sep) that I must try and take more photos of people working rather than just sat for lunch. This time, Fri. 18th October, I have done that – although it was all a bit rushed near the end of the session as the light faded and rain threatened.
Showing the vegetation n the leat.
The photograph above shows a little of the vegetation in the leat although following photos show it more fully.
One brush-cutter in action.
There were sixteen volunteers offering their labour today: Barbara & Roger, Bill, Chris, Derek, Elaine & John, Emily, John L, Mally, Nigel, Peter, Stephanie, Sylvia, Val and myself: making 16. This was quite notable considering that the weather forecast said there could be heavy showers. Having cancelled a day on the 3rd Oct. I was sticking to my guns this time, with the help of the bones, of course, for divination.
Showing bracken, gorse and bramble in the leat.
Another noteworthy feature of today’s turnout is that Chris, Derek, John L, Keith, Nigel, Peter and Roger gave us seven machinists – brush-cutter operators.
Using the brush-cutter that has a hedge-trimmer attachment.
The photograph above shows a brush-cutter with a hedge-trimming attachment being used to effectively “mow” alongside the leat. I haven’t seen this in use for quite some time – Derek will be getting the chainsaw attachment back in use next!
Now, where’s the next lot?
With all the help today, we made very good progress until just after 2 pm when the light faded and a few drops of rain were felt. Having felt that we had had the best of the day already, and seeing signs of rain in the distance, we called a halt and started packing up.
Part of the 300 metres cleared today.
When the leat was originally cleared, having been hidden from view under high gorse in many places, this took us five years. We were happy to make 50 or 60 yards a session.
Today’s end point.
Today I measured the distance cleared as being 302 metres with a GPS unit, with an error of ±2 metres: not bad! This length has been added to the recently started Google aerial view map of the area. If you zoom in on the map, the “northernmost” purple locator marks the end point of our work today. Thank you, everyone. PS – I nearly forgot, we had a crispy nut cake from Sylvia at coffee time and what I will call a sort of fruit cake from Stepahanie after lunch. Thank you, both.