Day 1 – Deturfing and site tours

The first day on site is always a challenge. There is so much to set up and to get going.

The weather was amazing. Hot, humid, close, and no clouds in sight. Despite this, we managed to put up the bell tent, take an extensive site tour, go through all of the risk assessment and health and safety information, introduce ourselves and even get down to some deturfing in the afternoon.

Here are some piccies of our first day.

After a morning of paperwork and introductions, we went on a site tour. Dave Allen took us through the long and complex history of the site.

The first half an hour over by the trench. We put the bell tent up and marked out our trench outline. Then the spades, mattocks and shovels came out…

This is what we began with. An overgrown (very nettle-y) space where trench in-fills were still visible, but limits of the box grid trenches were not clear. We began with removing the grass. Deturfing in the heat was hardwork, and we had to swap teams often.

This shot looks back towards the Old House. We’ve begun to dig into the turf, but there’s still a long way to go until we can clearly see the trench limits.