What a brilliant weekend.....

[Tom]

....the crap off the coping stones and setts of my local canal

The Manchester, Bolton & Bury canal, a few miles away. Its undergoing restoration, should be finished in 3-5 years. We (the society) have been clearing the crap off the towpath, cutting trees, removing overgrowth, etc.

Its hard work, theres years of soil and weeds in many places. Most of the canal hasn't seen any boats whatsoever for more than 70 years. To reveal the extra setts we did in some of the pictures takes an entire day, and theres still another 3-4 rows left to get to the brick wall on the edge. The results are well worth the time and effort though, after a few days rain they'll look great.

I can't wait for the canal to become navigable, its going to be ace.

In case you're wondering where it is we were working, its here:

http://tinyurl.com/2h2dfj

The river Irwell is the main waterway, the canal runs across it via Presolee Aqueduct, which is the large arched structure (grade II listed) in the piccie above.

I did an overlay for Google Earth that shows a fair section of the path of the canal in 1850, so you can see how much work there is to be done. I'll finish the overlay next week I reckon.

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/tom.jeffs4/Google Earth/MB&B canal.kmz


Now I'm going to lie down for a bit. I have walking muscles, cycling muscles, carrying-heavy-things muscles, but no digging muscles My body is like a battlefield

 

[throdgrain]

Yer bloody tree-hugger

Well done mate, good effort tbh

 

[Tom]

heh, the one place you won't find your average yoghurt knitter is at the end of a shovel, all those years of eating lentils and quorn, they wouldn't have the muscles

 

[Calaen]

Fair play Tom I hope it all gets done. When you are finished my Garden has about years of weeds, I could use a buffed up shovel user

 

[Mobius]

The Time team lot have really let themselves go...

Looks like good fun, and nice to keep a bit of local history alive.

 

[rynnor]

Is that bin laden hiding in the last photo? Dark glasses make a good disguise

 

[Mey]

I thought it was santa

Good Job

 

[TdC]

Is that bin laden hiding in the last photo? Dark glasses make a good disguise

that chap slightly left of center in the last frame? that's Tom

 

[Calaen]

There seems to be alot of people standing around watching 1 guy work if you ask me

 

[Tom]

They were late in the day, everybody was knackered

12 hours of shovelling over 2 days is a bit tiring

 

[Draylor]

Why is the tree hugger cutting down a tree?

 

[Tom]

Because the tree is destroying the towpath and shouldn't be there

And that treehugger drives a 4x4

 

[evzy]

I always wondered what the village people did next........