Mist or wood-smoke?

By the Session Leader:

Not a good omen for the day when the fog was hiding street lights, and the forecast suggested it could continue all day: 

Never mind, WGG can cope!

We were told, two weeks in advance, that we would be coppicing again.  On the day, however, when we got to our RV point, we were told that other groups had finished that bit of coppicing, and had started clearing the willows which were obscuring the views from the observation hut by the ‘Poplar Pools’.

After a long trek through the more than usually dark woods, we came to the hut, right down by the river:

Note the blankets were not there for airing but to make it safe to get over the barbed wire fence. 

Now, where were these Pools?

One was to our left:

And there was the first pile of willow brash waiting to be burned, with far more to be cut.  [You can just make out the brash pile through the mist: background, right-hand side. – Ed.]

“There is so much,” said the site warden, “that we need two fires.”  We thought that just getting one going would be an achievement in the dank, misty conditions, and all the wood dripping with moisture.  

Nevertheless, we set to.  The site was very uneven and slippery, so great care had to be taken.  One volunteer did try sitting down, inadvertently, getting a nice clean coat muddy.  But too quick for the camera!

Obviously the technique of bowing to the fire worked wonders:

The combination of mist and smoke reduced visibility considerably:

[That was what the scene looked like to the camera lens at the time.  Below is the image ‘treated’ after the session. – Ed.]

While one group tended the fire, another group worked on the bank of the river to the left cutting more willow. 

Meantime, a third group kept to the right of the bank, well away from the smoke, and found a bigger prize to be cut down …

sawn up …

and carried away, not to the bonfire, but as logs for the Earth Trust boilers:

There was some speculation about the hut being used for our tea-break.  That, however, would have been too comfortable: not Green-Gym style at all.  So we had the usual standing break:

[Again, thanks to the wonders of technology, you can see better what was going on than volunteers could at the time. – Ed.]