On Friday 12th September 2014, we got up super early and drove out to Basing House to await the arrival of the digger to help with the covering of the Basing House Project’s 2014 field season trench.

We couldn’t resist a quick snap in the trench before it was covered.

From left to right: Nicole, Jude, Chris and Gareth wave goodbye to the Basing House Project 2014 season trench.

Seven hours, approximately one hundred ant bites, two hundred nettle stings, four packs of biscuits, and some back-breaking turf carrying later, the trench had been filled from the spoil heap and had been covered using the turf that had been removed two months earlier.

We had a lot of fun on Friday, but there was also some sadness too, as there always is at the end of a field season.

As you can see from the video, we were kept occupied as we had a lot to do!

However, the excitement of the Basing House Project does not end here. There are still lots of things for us to do, and we will keep you informed with our activities on this blog. This week we are creating 3D models of some of our more fascinating artefacts, and we will share these online as soon as they are ready. The team are planning to share the digitised archive of the excavation, and we’ll publicise this as it is made available on this blog, including small finds photographs and plans from the trench.

Some of the fantastic students who were with us this year have written blog posts about their research projects, and these will appear on this blog over the next few weeks.

Finally, we would like to extend a heartfelt thank-you to Barry, Yvonne and Jess who spent the day on site with us last week carrying turf and stamping down soil. We could not have done it without you!

We would also like to thank James of Ableman Plant Hire Ltd who came in his very cool digger and covered the trench in super quick time.