Camp report:
Ipswich & Stowmarket Navigation Ipswich & Stowmarket Camp Baylham Lock, August 8-15 Itinerary Sat: Arrive Pub Sun: Dig out rubble and lay binding layer for section of lock floor Bowling Mon: Concrete pour (6 cubic metres) Brewery tour Tue: Dig out rubble in last section of lock Swimming/Spa Wed: Continue digging out rubble and lay final binding layer Cinema Thu: Concrete pour (6 cubic metres) Boat trip Fri: Tool cleaning/sorting, scaffolding, brick laying etc. Barbecue Sat: Leave
It should have been simple, except that the lock is built on a natural spring...
so efficient that one afternoon a lot of us went to visit the rare breeds farm and another a van full went back to the hall early!! By Friday morning we were cleaning and packing tools whilst quietly ignoring Colin the local s suggestion that we might want to root through the spoil pile looking for whole bricks to salvage. The work in the lock was back-breaking all week, leading to Andy and Brian shocking us all with their endurance in contrast I was so knackered I was being sent to wash tools after Monday s afternoon tea break. Luckily Kim appointed herself in charge of making everyone take a break and drink water regularly, so no-one actually expired. The job itself was moving all the rubble to one side and putting the shuttering, drainage pipes and blinding layer in place. Then dumper-full after dumper-full of concrete was poured in from the top of the lock. After this we had to manually shift the concrete into position, vibrate it and tamp it into the correct curve after which we realised there was too much concrete and Ellie and I formed an amazing bucket chain to get the concrete Andy and Brian were hurriedly shovelling into buckets back out of the lock
Nigel Lee
As you can see above Ed and Nigel s plan for the week was really quite simple: clear out the lock and finish laying a concrete invert floor (curved to help hold the walls in place). In addition to this there was some more concreting to do behind the walls, some bricklaying, some correction of Liz s camp s concrete (not their fault the weather was evil), a little bricklaying and some excavating. In parallel Harri excelled herself in the kitchen producing ever more food we soon learned when it was going to be a hard day as there would be porridge as well as a fry-up for breakfast. None of this was a problem for our hardy group of new and more experienced Pouring the first section of the new invert volunteers. In fact we were
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