How difficult is it to predict the weather just 12 hours ahead?

The forecast was telling us that we were going to have a total washout. We changed our plans, yet again, and surprise, surprise, not a drop of rain came down…

Mr Weatherman – you have but one job!!

Anyhow, a double-digit turnout today with Marcus, Reece, Dave, Matt, Steve, David, Martin, Ian, Mark, and Paul. We hunkered down under the Bear pub bridge in an effort to have some protection from the torrential downpour that never came, and carried on trying to break up the tree canopy to get the sunlight in, so more wildflowers and grasses can grow on the path floor.

It’s the flat-bottomed V (\_/) that we’re looking for, and with mature trees lining the path to really emphasise the woodland aspect, and considering the number of people coming past, it’s getting a lot of use, despite the Berrybanks flood defence pond overflowing in the night.

At halftime, we enjoyed birthday cake and coffee – Happy Birthday, Matt. We hope you had a super day.

The views up and down from our stronghold.

It’s going the right way.

Martin and Steve went off on a mission to locate posts that are called mile markers and would have been used when the railway was operational as a way of identifying a certain point on the line.

Due to some rather amazing mapping work, Martin worked out the exact location of these marker posts, and we actually found some of them.

The plan is to replicate them in wood and replace them. We will probably need to measure the size of the numbers and get some replacements made up with a 3D printer. The posts would have been every quarter of a mile.

Here are a couple from the Leamington end that have been discovered and painted.

It’s just a nod to the heritage of the path as a working railway for 130 years, before being closed in the 1980s.

Super sleuthing, Martin and Steve.

Ian and Marcus headed to the darkest northern part of the path and started to slowly widen it.

We have one more week on this first 600 metre section, so we will all be working on the last 200 metre part of the path, and that will be it for this cutting-back season. What doesn’t get done this year will be at the top of the list for next year.

In October, we jump to a 900 metre section which is from the Underpass to the Cawston Bridleway bridge. It’s a 5-week month, and we have done a lot of work on it at the end of last year’s cutting-back season, so it should be relatively easy.

We did our customary litter pick. Not a lot, so it feels like things are getting back to normal now that all the naughty squirrels are back at squirrel school.

And yes, you guessed it – no broken benches to distract us from our quest.

Even this one, which has been built, smashed, and rebuilt so many times, and from so many randomly different parts, that I now call it the Frankenstein bench. It was formally the Berrybanks picnic bench.

Lastly, in an effort to project ourselves in a logo, I’m thinking of this…

Let me know what you think?

Thanks for reading if you got this far.

Until next time!

Paul