Friday 13th April
There was a distinct family feel to to work party on Friday as Peter and John enlisted the help of Peter's father to drive the dumper and George to help with the labouring.
The skip was delivered at 7am and the excavator and dumper were working by 8am. With John H on the excavator and John M on the dumper the first objective was to clear the area behind the gates to the car park, where spoil from the erection of the fence and gates had accumulated. George worked in the skip spreading the spoil whilst Peter picked lumps of concrete and brick out of the spoil as it was excavated. We have created a flat area inside the gates about 7m wide by 7m across with a reasonably gentle slope onto the main "plateau".
When Hazel and Ewan arrived with Hazel's friend to spectate the family theme continued. It is never too soon to start training the next generation of volunteer workers so we took the opportunity to introduce Ewan to the excavator, though he could not be persuaded to sit on the dumper.
The second objective was to complete the earthworks around the new gates to the wharf. Currently there is a hump where the ramp to the old access used to be. That was removed and the levels graded back to about 1m inside the proposed fence line. The area outside the fence was topsoiled in preparation for grass seeding. It will now be possible to erect another couple of panels of permanent fence so the wharf gates can be used for access.
The third work item was was grading the west end of the conservation area. This area had been left hummocky as soil had been moved around and using the excavator to trim it was much easier than doing so by hand. A final trim will be necessary once it has weathered a little (let us hope for a few more frosty nights in April) before it can be raked and topsoiled.
The final task was to start stripping topsoil from the new car parking area on the Club's land in preparation for creating a hardstanding for storage. A start was made but profiles for setting out will need to be erected to enable the job to be completed.
