Wednesday 18 September 2013

Day 3 – our numbers swelled to 10 today, including Roger. Again we began with Roger showing us the draft results of our previous work in both fields and discussing what further surveying he would like us to do.

Trying to understand the mysteries of geophysics  (c) photo Jane Lunnon 

 We then divided into small groups – Alison was delighted to investigate the changes in the structure of the field walls; Pat & Phil recorded the established positions of the corners of the grids, with the help of our old friend "Bob".

For those of you who have not met him, "Bob" is a Total Station, who records data such as OS reference points and heights, etc  - all you need is for someone to hold the prism over the point to be recorded, while another person presses "Bob's" correct  buttons! The tricky thing is knowing which are the correct buttons to press!

Roger's moment of inspiration fails to impress everyone (c) photo Jane Lunnon 

Pat and Phil (again with Bob's help) then made a detailed record of both sides of the wall dividing fields 1 and 2. This was followed by further recording important points on the wall as noted by Alison – 15 to date, but more to come.

Meanwhile a further 17 grids, beyond the ones we did yesterday, were laid out, and geophysed, each of us taking turns with laying out the ropes and using the 'zimmer frame'. This means that we have now geophysed almost (but not quite) half of field one.

The tricky problem of geophysics around the portaloo (c) photo Jane Lunnon 

We were delighted to welcome a visitor Peter Longbottom this afternoon, who came to see what we were up to. He showed great interest in the surveying and was also able to answer one or two of Roger's queries about the area. 

We are always pleased to see anyone who is interested on site. I believe we are back to field 2 tomorrow for more of the same.

 Ruth Spencer,     UWHG