Just because it’s June

By ‘C’:

The modern meteorologists had it right today: the morning dawned bright and sunny, then clouded over.

It was the right weather for Green Gym though.  Yesterday may have looked very fine in the sun – June bustin’ out all over, and all that – but it was “the ideal temperature today: not too hot.”  Just right for the English roses on site too:

As it happened, my walk to today’s site took me past the latest blue plaque to have been unveiled in Oxfordshire, to a meteorologist of a previous era:

Before starting work in the stream (a little further upstream from the photograph above), the site warden advised us that “it might be a little bit higher than you’ve experienced before.”  This turned out not to be a problem, but more than one volunteer commented that they had never seen it flowing so fast.  Some recalled times when the stream has barely been able to trickle over the waterfall, which today was in fine shape:

Our task: weeding.  It seemed a shame to be getting rid of some plants, but a weed is
a weed is a plant in the wrong place:

The only glitch during the morning was a wheelbarrow which seemed to have difficulties with vertical alignment, especially when loaded with vegetation of different moisture content (and uneven volumes of mud with it):

One volunteer observed that barrow-loads from the far side seemed to be heavier, and got these answers:

It’s because of the water.

– I’m sure it’s heavy water this side of the stream.

– Ah, you mean nuclear water.

– No, it’s very clear water.

Today’s task was one of those where we could see what large quantities of excess vegetation we were taking out (and feel in our muscles what a good workout it had been), yet when we looked back, it could be hard to see where we had been:

Before

Before

After

After