7. Thursday 14 October 2010

With the close of summer the time had come for us to close down the site.
So we donned the wellies again and picked up our buckets and spades, prepared for a hard morning’s work of backfilling.

But apart from one instance when Jane had to give Ruth a helping hand to extricate herself from the mud at the bottom of the slope, the job of backfilling went surprisingly quickly and easily.

The stone structure was already succumbing to mossy growth, and the intrusion of young weeds, so it was certainly time to give the site some protection again. With the generous donation of a large pile of beautiful top soil provided by a neighbouring farmer, we took little more than a couple of hours to cover the site, leaving just the kerb stones exposed to indicate the location of the kiln – or bread oven – or whatever we decide it was.

You missed a bit!

We had plenty of time to enjoy leisurely hot drinks and delicious hand-made Belgian chocolates from the village shop as we sat by Burnsall green, enjoying a quiet day with lovely views, in this normally busy tourist hotspot. Today, we just had the ducks for company.

The structure covered over again

We await David's forthcoming research and report on the intriguing little Hartlington site with great anticipation.

Jane Lunnon, UWHG