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Camp report

Grantham Canal

rebuilding Woolsthorpe

Lock 15, with plans for

locks 14 and 13 to follow in

the forthcoming years...

Grantham Canal 5 - 12 August

To start this report, we will go right back to the Bonfire Bash in 2016: as normal during

Saturday afternoon the WRG Committee had done the biz, and in the evening for everyone to see, was a list of camps for 2017.

As people came off site, the boards were up with details of camps - and several people went forward and put their name

down to either lead or assist or even cook for a camp. After the food that the cooks had produced for Saturday evening and the normal speeches, including the one from our glorious chairman Mr MKP MBE himself, saying about the boards and the lists, I went off to wash up.

Unbeknown to me two people were working in cahoots together, and as I sat down with a beer, I was asked by Kirsty “are you leading any camps during the summer?”, I said “No I have enough trouble preparing for a Festival, I won’t have time”.

I should have realised there was a look between Kirsty and Maria (my wife), and

then it got mentioned that Kirsty would like

to assist with someone and would I be interested in doing a Grantham Camp?

Not liking Grantham I said “no not really”; well I think they got me drunk and stupidly I agreed... I think they call it the power of woman!

So, to the camp. Having driven by some strange place in Birmingham, we ended up at the hall, Kirsty was waiting and we sorted out some bits and pieces and Maria went off shopping.

RAF Martin had also arrived with a couple of other people and did the collections from the train station and soon we were all present, a good mix of experienced and newbies, two DofE’ers and people who seemed have travelled from Switzerland, Spain, and two from France.

Saturday night we did the normal Health & Safety talk with video, cook did her talk, we ate a lovely meal and got ready for the morning.

I will add that the Hall at Cropwell

Grantham Canal Fact File

The Canal Camp project: Rebuilding Lock 15 on the Woolsthorpe Flight

Length: 33 miles

Locks: 18

Date closed: 1936

Why? This is part of a major Heritage Lottery Fund backed project by Grantham Canal Society with support from the Canal & River Trust to restore lock 15 of the seven-lock Woolsthorpe flight - fol

lowed by Lock 14. Unfortunately it turned out to be in a much worse state than had been realised, so what had been expected to be a repair has turned into more of a demolition and rebuild job.

The wider picture: As well as being an important restoration task in itself, the work is being used as a heritage skills training exercise for the Society and CRT to help provide a pool of volunteers for the next

Nottingham

To Newark Proposed diversion

stage, locks 12-13.

Trent to

It’s also a step

Shardlow

towards creating a

10-mile restored length to

Restored length

Cropwell Original route

Redmile

Woolsthorpe Locks 12-18

Grantham

Redmile - and in the medium term,

obstructed

completing the Long Pound to Cropwell.

The Long Pound Canal Camp Restored length

Bishop is not a bad hall and has showers, but the village and location is a bit lacking in entertainments except for a pub, so asked if anyone was wanting to go to the cinema or anything else but no one seemed to be interested. Each night time was spent on jigsaws or card games, we did one night have a quiz that had been set by Becky, which was very entertaining, thanks Becky. It was very interesting watching games of Twister...

Work on site at Lock No 15 on the Woolsthorpe flight: there was a small team making a block wall; another team were making a stone wall; a lot of cleaning out and pointing was completed; the wooden invert at the base of the lock had to be cleaned so that a Canal & River Trust person could come in and take photos, make sketches and measure. This was for future records, but also so that stop planks can be fitted. We also had a volunteer go with CRT to do site levels, and on the following day,

she did it all again but with another couple of volunteers.

One day away from site we went to find some blocks that will be used for lock wall coping stones; they will not be enough for the complete lock, but as CRT had no idea what was really there, at least some will be used on a later camp. [See the article on with not having enough coping stones ...Ed]

Like several canal camps this year we also lost a day to the weather. The site had become a bit too slippery to walk on so we stayed in the hall, no one was interested in going anywhere, when it did stop raining several parties of volunteers went off on a

wander around the village, or along the canal which runs through it.

On site, we took the volunteers down to the next two locks 14 and 13, so that people could see how their efforts fitted into the long term plans.

I would like to thank Kirsty for being an excellent Assistant, Maria for all the excellent food, RAF Martin for being RAF Martin - he did some brickwork, helped and guided others, and drove a van most days - and Stephen for his help with driving the vehicles.

And thanks to all the volunteers for all their work and input, they were all awesome, the camp achieved a lot and it helped to move the project forward.

This camp was the first of 4 booked at Grantham, so at the end we passed over the accommodation and site to Mr MKP MBE and Bex for their week.

Dave ‘Moose’ Hearnden

Camp report

Uttoxeter family camp

venture for WRG: a weekend

camp on the Uttoxeter Canal

organised specially for young

people and their families

WRG Family Canal Camps: History in the Making!

Friday 21 st to Sunday 23 rd July saw history in

the making for WRG when seven young

people aged 9 to 12 years joined their par

ents or grandparents on the first ever WRG

Family Camp. The camp led by Alex Melson and assisted by Jenny Hodson took place on the Uttoxeter Canal, with a mix of activities that would encourage young people to get

involved in enjoying the environment around canals.

The weekend got off to a shaky start when all the electricity in the village went off including at the accommodation. Unfortunately, having undertaken a shopping trip on his way to the accommodation on Friday, Alex arrived with ice cream to find the fridge freezer was no longer a fridge freezer, rather just a large white box! Oddly enough the ice cream melted before most arrived on Friday evening.

The accommodation was a mix of indoor bunk rooms (where young people had one room and immediately set to turning bunk beds into dens) with adults in a separate room and a third room for the family with the only young girl on the camp. Alex and Jenny choose to brave the outdoors and stayed in tents just outside the accommodation.

A mix of games and activities were arranged for evening entertainment, with sports bag should the weather decide to be nice… Unfortunately in the evening it wasn’t really, so not much outdoor games and sporting took part. But a Bop-It challenge ran throughout the weekend, with Alex setting the target score, soon to be upset and shown by the young people how to play. Secret attempts were

tried as practise but at the end of the weekend young James managed to get both the highest scores, so was declared winner. (A not too sore losing camp leaders quote of the weekend being “it’s not losing if you

quit!” Very good Alex.) Other competitions included building structures from spaghetti

Pictures by Jenny Hodson

Bat boxes under construction and complete

mess on the floors tables and everywhere a marshmallow may have touched.

In fact competition became the rule of

the weekend with day one morning activity

being Himalayan Balsam picking and sculpting. Families were split into their individual units for the only time over the weekend with the aim of the biggest pile of balsam and then used to design a piece of artwork or sculpture. Entries varied from a large throne and a full canal boat to a guerrilla warfare helmet and a woven Staffordshire knot. This was then judged by WRG Facebook members with the competition being won by the Staffordshire knot. The young people themselves began their own competition with the balsam trying to see

who could find the tallest plant, many laying out along the bridge plants that must have been at least three times their own height. To finish the day off, (again to quote Alex) we served lovingly prepared “lasargnia”!! Being served alongside with balsam flowers with the salad, a new culinary experience for many on camp.

Other tasks on camp included a bit of moss clearance off the drill bore stones revealing the local geology under the Churnet Valley. We also searched for the historical architecture by digging out an area to try to discover the area of a former bridge. Sunday alongside this saw bat box building and then these were erected in trees by Alex, Steve Wood and Peter Johnson, so those who walked back to the accommodation could play spot the box.

Whilst our team were busy with their work the local Caldon & Uttoxeter Canal Society volunteers were around Tirforing tree trunks out of the lock walls and some of our team volunteered to go across and give a hand - nice to see locals and visitors sharing laughs and working together and acceptance of young people on the site.

All in all the weekend went well, with new friends being made and young people

having enjoyed a new experience, one family all totally new to WRG as father had himself never tried this type of activity before - but left saying he would love to come back again. We would like to thank Alison and her family who stayed and worked with us: Alison is part of the local group alongside Steve the chairman who made his guest appearances over the weekend despite insisting on Friday that he wouldn’t be around.

Finally a massive thank you to all the families who joined us over the weekend to make this a memorable experience and what we hope to be the first of many Family Camps!

Jenny Hodson

Above: balsam pulling. Below: the team

Camp report

Shrewsbury & Newport

a late addition to the summer

programme after a canal camp

elsewhere had to be postponed.

So how did they get on?

Shrewsbury and Newport Canals 19-26 August

The Stover Canal Camp Shrewsbury and

Newport Canal Camp, a grand total of 109

201 miles from our base at Newport (not to

be confused with the Newport in Wales) was an absolutely knackering fantastic week with

great volunteers both from WRG & the

Shrewsbury & Newport Canal Trust. A late addition to the Canal Camps season as a result of having the Stover Canal Camp cancelled.

Out of the 12 volunteers attending the

camp the leader (myself) was the fourth least experienced person on camps in regards to number of camps attended. And I must admit it was great to have a wealth of knowledge and skills on the camp.

Everyone managed to work their way to the accommodation; most of us coming from home but a hardy few coming from other canal camps: Susan from beyond the wall and Andy (assistant leader and most inaccurate weatherman) came from Inglesham with Adrian ‘why is there no cup holder in this

dumper’ Sturgess coming from the previous Grantham Camp. We also had ourselves a Welsh contingent in the form of our lovely cook (morale booster) Bev and Sue, who likes to rip shorts! WRGie veterans David Babbs and Dave ‘Evvo’ Evans also joined us leading the way on the towpath front, with Ninja Adam joining us for his second camp and our only newbie for the week Nathan ‘always up for seconds’ O’brien. Oh and not

forgetting our grand tour of British nationalities Ian ‘three scoops of ice cream’ Gaston originally from Northern Ireland. A good number of Shrewsbury & Newport Canals Trust volunteers also joined us throughout the week and attended the Health & Safety briefing on the first night, followed by the first of many trips to the pub.

With most canal camps, Sundays are always a slow start, especially on towpaths,

where a significant progress on removing the top soil in necessary before everyone can get involved. Whilst half the group started on preparing the towpath, the rest were split

Shrewsbury & Newport Fact File

Length: 25 miles

Locks: 25

Date closed: 1944

The Canal Camp project: Relaying a length of the towpath between Tickethouse Lock 21 in Newport and a local park

Why? To enable local people to walk the route, in the hope of raising

awareness of the canal and support for eventual reopening to navigation.

Shropshire Union

to Ellesmere Port

Locks Norbury

Junction To Autherley 1-17 A 4 1

The wider picture: The Canal Trust has already carried out

Newport

work at Forton Aqueduct east of Newport, with the short-term target of re-watering a length, and the medium term goal of reopening from Norbury to Newport. Work has also taken place on other sites with Shrewsbury

A5

Eyton

Wappenshall

Canal Camp

Trench Locks

(not proposed

Trench for restoration)

site: Newport

Former Shropshire

tub-boat canals (not

into pairs to complete some of the smaller jobs including vegetation clearance, including one large tree literally hanging on by a thread (okay maybe single line of barbed

wire), removing an old interpretation board and installing a new one, clearing the nearby bridge of vegetation and rebuilding a fence on the bridge ramparts.

By noon on the first day we already hit our first SNAFU (turns out Microsoft Word doesn’t try and correct you on this word, after looking up what the acronym stands for,

it was only a minor SNAFU). The SNAFU in question was the rapid

realisation that the original towpath

plan of digging out either side of the towpath and leaving as much of the original in place to reduce the amount of material required had to be altered. This was due to the path below extending further than anticipated in width & depth making it significantly more difficult to excavate. Plan B took a while to sort out

but we settled on lowering the whole path by ‘a bit’ (technical term there!) and having to raise the timber

Pictures by Alex Melson

Driving in one of the 440 stakes for the path edge boards

boards on each side and using the

soil/turf excavated to ease the pressure being exerted by the newly dumped MOT material. After a slow start and getting to grips with the work, we made about 30 metres in total for the first day, putting us behind schedule.

As the week progressed, the team got into the stride of laying the towpath with further teams working on different jobs throughout the week. The process involved laying the timber path edge boards parallel at 1.5m width, driving the stakes at metre intervals (equating to four per board –roughly 440 stakes in total driven in during the week) and nailing them in. Once the boards were ready the Terram geotextile material was laid, and the dumper loads of MOT Type 1 aggregate were dumped between the boards, then compacted down

with a roller – eventually followed by the fine granite dust to give it a finer finish. This is pretty much how the work went for the majority of the week and I won’t bore you with the details, but as the week went on the quicker and more efficient we became with completing the process.

The evening saw the volunteers gather around the projector (luckily being based in a school it was pre set) and watch Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.

By the time Tuesday rolled round we

knew what we were doing and beginning to

make back time lost over the previous days. We were also joined by two of the S&N volunteers John and Sue (bringing the total number of Sues up to 3!) providing a much

needed boost to the work. Our resident plant expert Adrian spent the day training up John to use excavators for use on the local Wappenshall project. Even newbie Nathan was passed on use of powered rollers.

In the evening the Shrewsbury and Newport Canal Trust organised a quiz night for us. Volunteers from both organisations enjoyed a lovely curry prepared by Bev, and competed for the first prize of a bottle of red wine.

By Wednesday all the bits-and-bobs jobs were completed and everyone moved onto the towpath. Throughout this time Adrian had already instructed a good portion of volunteers both from the local trust and our camp and training continued throughout

on tracked dumpers, Nathan on rollers and Ian as an instructor for tracked dumpers

Thursday carried on the same as the previous days, but in the evening we went

bowling together with some of the local trust

members – and even managed to form a team of Sue, Sue, Sue and Sue, no confusion there, right? With platters a-plenty, a thoroughly

enjoyable evening… I suppose I’m supposed to say something about Andy beating me by a few points but that’s not important!

With the last day of the camp and our

target for the end game, everyone set to

work to get the site prepped for the final

push. This day was by far the most efficient we were all week (you’d expect that after a week, I suppose) and with the end in sight,

energy levels were up. Sue from beyond the wall started off the day with a bit of brushcutter work supervised by myself, whilst the rest of the team got straight back into the work.

Throughout the day as we reopened sections of path, we were joined many volunteers of the Shrewsbury & Newport Canal

Levelling the towpath surface

Trust, and more of the local community

complimented us on the work completed. As the team placed fine granite onto the path,

Darren on the excavator went across the site and landscaped the edges with mounds of turf

and soil excavated previously, to tidy up the site. The finishing touches to the towpath were

completed (whacker plate, roller, and removing excess Terram. After a hard week’s work we

packed up site and were invited to have a

tour of the local lock house (currently in redevelopment to be bought back to its origi

nal state). We then loaded up the trailer and checked our equipment.

I won’t bore anyone with the end-ofcamp pack up.

All that is left to say is a massive thank

you to everyone involved in the camp: from the Shrewsbury & Newport Canals Trust,

who as always welcomed us and supported us throughout the week, to every single volunteer who tolerated me for an entire week and worked themselves to extreme lengths to get the towpath finished. Also to Adrian for his work on training everyone up on various machinery. And thank you to Ian for supporting the camp throughout the week and being heavily involved in the camp logistics; to Assistant Andy, who despite failing to call seconds most days maintained motivation and quality-controlled the towpath; and of course to Bev, the most important person who kept us fed and alive all week.

Cheers for a great and knackering week!