It was a crisp morning with a clear blue sky - cold but at least sunny and dry, perfect for the days volunteer work party. With my hat and my gloves on, I actually felt warm as I stood in the car-park waiting for the volunteers to arrive, in the weak morning sun. It wasn't to last! As the final volunteer arrived, and I began to explain the proceedings of the day, a thick bank of cold fog rolled in from Porton Down and enveloped our surroundings, sending shivers through us as the temperature suddenly dropped. "oh well, it will burn of in no time" we all said as we gathered our tools together and marched off in to the gloom to start our days work.
The task for the day was to clear areas of scrub along the woodland section of the nature trail, to provide viewing windows in to the wildflower meadow and so enhancing the visitor experience. We used bowsaws and loppers to cut through entangled lengths of "old mans beard" and Ivy, which at times was like trying to untangled a giant ball of wool! We also removed bits of scrub along the fence line. This work will not only benefit visitors but we also hope it will encourage a more diverse ground flora, in place of the thick green carpet of ivy.
As the windows were opened up, or as one volunteers said "the curtains", we sadly were not bathed in sunlight, but with more fog which was refusing to lift. But we could see a faintly glowing ball - the sun - through the murk, so evidently, it would burn off soon enough.
The view through one of the newly created windows!
A volunteer looms in to view
A welcome rest came in the form of mince pies and hot coffee, but with the damp fog cooling us down fast, we were quickly back to work again. The team worked really hard and got most of the work done before lunch time. And incredibly the sun decided to make an appearance just in time for lunch, and we all enjoyed basking in its warmth and taking in the newly revealed views as we tucked in to a well earnt sandwich - one volunteer even had a nap.
As we enjoyed the sun, we watched in the distance as yet another bank of fog came rolling down the hill towards us. This put an end to our tea break as we all started to cool down again, and we all cracked on with finishing the remaining work, and tidying up. The fog never really cleared all day, but with the windows opened up along the edge of the woodland, the effect of the sunlight and fog through the tree was quite beautiful. We hope it will make a great difference to the nature trail for all who use it in the future!
The fog rolling in from Porton Down
Keeley