Down at the scrub-bash club

By the Session Leader:

The décor would have been lovely, if we had been able to see it:

Actually the views improved vastly the moment we got a drop of sunshine, but that was not till much later:

We were on a track at a part of the reserve that seemed new to us:

The task was to continue the coppicing that others had started:

Trees marked with orange tape, and the more ancient specimens were out of bounds to us (attended to by staff only):

Coppiced wood had to be dragged out and carried down the slope …

to where our fire marshal was gloomily surveying the task of lighting a bonfire with wet wood in a very damp mist:

Then there was the long trudge back up the slope to collect more wood:

The marshal, with lots of helpers, did succeed with a good blaze:

At the end, the site manager demonstrated how much quicker the cutting would have been with more powerful tools.  They would not, however, have helped with the dragging:

So the gentry, distinguished by their sticks (the latest in Green-Gym fashion accessories), were finally able to admire the view: