Whose idea was this anyway?

Memories of last week (10th October) have faded but we can all still recall that creepy sucking noise that the Greenhow mud makes as you try to extricate one or more of your boots from its fond embrace.  Catriona tells me her boots have only just dried out today (17th) which is unsurprising.

But, despite the conditions, we soldiered on, Tony earning the prize for most time spent under water (see left hand side of wall in pic above).  To be fair, Greenhow didn't give us its best shot and we were spared the soaking that had sent us scuttling for cover the previous week.  So we were half way up the final stint by the end of the day.

The Met Office, so often wrong this summer, got it pretty much bang on for 17th October.  We all peered bleerily into a dark and soggy dawn and immediately concluded that home was where we all should be, at least until 10:00 am.  By 10:00, the clouds hard begun to part, allowing watery sunshine to persuade Robert (finally got a day off), Graham, Roger, Paul, Phillip that maybe Greenhow wouldn't be such a bad idea after all. 

And so it turned out.  Yes, we were ankle deep in the black stuff, but it stayed dry and not-too-windy and we were able to finish off the final stint.  Hopefully Graham will publish his snaps for you all to admire from the comfort of your warm armchairs.

So that's it for Greenhow.  Kev sends his thanks for all who contributed - he seemed well impressed with our efforts both in terms of quantity and quality.  Next week it's off to Hackfall Woods where with luck we can wile away a reasonably sheltered winter.

There's wet, and then there's ..... a sinking feeling

OK, bad idea but it had to be worth a try.  Sunny periods and showers, said the Met Office.  Yeah, right.

It rained as we were driving over; it rained as we were unloading the kit; it rained as we slithered into our waterproofs; and it carried on raining as we trudged to the wall.  Then it stopped long enough for us to view the puddles along the finished wall and the blackness of the mud where we stripped out on our last visit.

Nothing daunted, Phillip, Roger, Tony, Richard and I set about demolishing the next stretch of wall.  Squelch, slither, slosh in the primeval slime as we attempted to set new foundations - tricky when the base is under water.  It had by now rained again and the downpour (shower?) intensified as we stopped for coffee.  Now you can rain on me, blow at me and bury me in snow but don't ... don't ever ... dilute my morning cuppa coffee.

A quick show of soggy hands and there was unanimity.  Sod it!  Let's go home.  So we did!

Welcome, by the way to the guys and gals of the NCV.  Happy to share a blogspot with you and to keep an eye on what you're all up to.  I'll be writing up the more slanderous version of what Tony and Ros got up to in Bryan's Wood as soon as I have consulted my lawyers!

Normal Service Resumed at Greenhow

OK, so blogs are a little sparse at the moment and just to enhance their scarcity value I'm going to roll three into one this week.

This week (26th September) has been declared a washout after two days of horrendous rain.  Last week was boggy enough despite Phillip's gallant attempts to lay down brushwood walkways and I suspect that today there would be standing water where we'd be standing and slithering.  We don't cancel often so I hope evryone is comfortable with the decision.

Last week saw an excellent turnout (11 brave souls at my count) in OK-ish weather conditions -chilly but dry and good progress was made with the second and third stints.  We've decided to tackle one more stretch before bidding farewell to Greenhow for the winter.

On 12th September the group offered one of its twice-yearly taster days on behalf of the AONB.  Numbers have been a bit disappointing of late but, given the kind of weather we were 'blessed' with, it was frankly amazing that two people were brave/daft enough to join us, as were 8 members who rallied to the call for help with the taster day.  Thanks everyone and particular thanks to David and Catherine for tasting some pretty wet conditions at Greenhow.  We hope you enjoyed yourselves and that you'll join us again sometime.

For those of you keen to see more photographic evidence of the group at work, Richard the Elder has loaded 101 (!) snapshots on to DropBox (eh?) at https://www.dropbox.com/home/Drystone#!/home/Drystone. 

Next week, we can all blog about what we did with our day off. Second thought; maybe not!

Freak weather strikes Greenhow!

The pictures (thanks to Richard and Tony) tell the story of last week's walling session, the most amazing feature of which was the weather ... bright sunshine ... on Greenhow.

In preparation for the AONB taster day, six of the team stripped out the next stretch of wall, laid foundations and completed the first course along the whole stint.  This will give our 'tasters' a level playing field to get them started - the muddy, heavy bit having been taken care of in advance.  Who says we're not nice people?



And the sun shines on the righteous ...

Wasn't sure whether to start with the sun shining on the righteous or something about fortune favouring the brave.  Well, at least it didn't rain on our new site up in Greenhow ... much.  To tell the truth, it absolutely bucketed down to begin with but, by the time we'd squelched around the site to size up the possibilities and had a cup of coffee, the rain miraculously ceased and we remained dry for the rest of the day ... in Greenhow!

Our new site is centred on a tiny miner's cottage called The Loanings.  Our host, Kev, is a waller himself, so no pressure there then.  Roger, Graham, Catriona and I completed a longish stint that Kev himself had started some time ago and between us we stripped out the next section.  This gave us a good opportunity to get used to the mixture of limestone and sandstone both of which are available on site.  Copes are, as usual, in short supply, but Kev gave us a good demonstration of ... how shall I put it? ... improvisation.

Commiserations to Phillip who never quite made it to site despite having driven all the way from Leeds.  Maybe we should get some of those little arrows on sticks printed with NAWG just like real contractors do.

I've told Kev we'll do 4-6 weeks up there, mainly because I suspect the weather will become increasingly inhospitable as the year progresses.  For now though, we can chalk one up to Greenhow.  See you next week?