An Update – FP56 on a beautiful sunny but cold morning
Hello – The work our PRoWlers wanted to do on FP56 was described in Episode 13. On Wednesday (yesterday) they started on the southern leg of the path.
Two PRoWlers and two Honorary PRoWlers (see the gallery below) arrived onsite at 9.30am with a mini-dumper on a trailer. The dumper and trailer had been kindly loaned to the PRoWlers by James Sherman in Knight’s Lane, one of Jonny’s neighbours. Thank you James.
However, proving that the best laid plans etc. are often compromised, our aggregate supplier, Bradfords in Axminster, let us all down. The boys had ordered 3 tons of scalpings to do the job, for delivery on Tuesday – not a difficult ask – but Bradfords said they only had 2 tons available, but they assured them that the third would be delivered to site first thing on Wednesday – just in time for the work.
I guess you know what (didn’t) happen? No third bag showed up, even after a couple of chasing phone calls.
So Jonny said to the small team, “Come on… let’s get these 2 tons out of the bags and on to the ground… and you never know, the third might turn up.” Of course, Ricky was itching to have a go on the dumper. “Children!” thought Jonny (in a kindly, generous way).
Unloading the dumper from the trailer was fun (!) because one of the tracks was frozen meaning the machine didn’t want to reverse in a straight line. Jonny was at the controls wrestling with “the beasty”, but eventually it thawed in the gentle sunshine and was then filled with the first load of scalpings by the Honorary PRoWlers.
The boys took it in turns, backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards. They calculated that the beasty could carry about 3 or 4 wheelbarrows worth of scalpings. It really made the job so much easier.
After the first bag was emptied, the gentleman who lives in the adjacent cottage, Peter, very kindly delivered tea, coffee and mince pies. Most welcome. What a hero – Thank you Peter.
A few more backwards and forwards, then a kindly villager who clearly thought everyone needed feeding up, Rita, turned up with… wait for it… Donuts! So of course we all had to stop and have a munch. Thank you Rita.
By about midday – both bags were empty and there was no sign of the third. Another phone call to Bradfords. No joy. Ricky decided to cancel the order in disgust.
The end result is that the path is much better than it was, but the team will keep an eye on it and they may revisit the site depending on how well it weathers over the next few weeks.
At the bottom of the page there’s a little gallery of photos, featuring the Honorary PRoWlers, Steve and Kathy.
A huge thank you to Steve K and Kathy A and for the support and generosity of James S, Peter B and Rita H. What a team!
(Oh! And from now on the boys have decided that Westcrete will be the supplier of choice. Shame!)
