Central Team
By Rob Clarke, sponsored by Heart of the Lakes cottages
December 2009 - All Hands on Deck!
All of a sudden we’re off the Fells again as winter starts to get a hold. We don’t work up on the hills for around four months every year, normally from the end of November to the beginning of March. The weather’s too bad and the days are too short for us to make the best use of our time up there so we get reacquainted with the rest of the National Trust staff in the area and work on low level jobs with them, such as hedge laying or dry stone walling.
At least, that’s how it’s supposed to go. Unfortunately, this year the weather had other plans. As most people will have noticed, there was a bit of rain in Cumbria at the end of November and as a result we’ve spent most of the last few weeks clearing up after the floods and checking on the state of our paths. Once again, the Lengthsmen have been an invaluable help in this, quickly organising a rota to get around all of the upland paths and report back on any damage. A very big thank you to them, it would have taken us ten times as long on our own. For more information on volunteering, go to www.fixthefells.co.uk.
With a few noticeable exceptions, such as Scarth Gap at Buttermere and the Goats Water path at Coniston, our upland paths have coped well with the bad weather. We wouldn’t have expected anything less really as we build them to deal with exceptional conditions in the first place. Lower level paths such as the one pictured here, up Tom Gill to Tarn Hows, have suffered more and there’s an awful lot of work to be done to repair all the damage.
Flood damage>
Above: There was a path on the left - now it’s a few hundred metres downstream!
Also making sudden demands on our time is the news that the RAF have offered the use of Merlin helicopters in January (with pilots hopefully!) to fly stone for next year’s upland path jobs. They get to use the time for training and we get the materials moved for free, so everyone wins. The only downside is that we normally have the stone flown later in the year so we’ve had a rush to get the helicopter bags filled in time. It’s a difficult job so in a way it’s good to be getting it out of the way before Christmas and not have to worry about it in the New Year.
Scar before>
Now you see it…..
Scar after>
Now you don’t!
Finally, at the end of the season we finished our job on Martcrag Moor. The two pictures above were taken from the same vantage point and show the section of path above the boggy moorland area. The first picture shows the large and widening scar that was opening up, causing increasing amounts of environmentally sensitive peat to be washed down the hillside, exposing valuable archaeology. The second picture shows the new sustainable line built over the top of the scar, with drainage along the sides to channel water away from the path surface.
It looks a little stark at the moment, being freshly built, but once it has settled in it should remain a pleasant and attractive path, protecting the landscape and archaeology, for years to come.
To find out more about the work carried out by Rob and his team, return to the team diary archive.