Raising the Stakes

45 GG Yorkies headed back to Forest School for bonfire night!

It was an epic crew including one brand new Pete, who got stuck straight in at the task (give him a big cheer!)

We had several tasks including:

• digging out silt and sand from the old big pond
• transporting silt and sand to the top of the hill by wheelbarrow and bucket
• digging out several wooden stakes from around the pond
• attempting to pull up the liner from the small pond
• creating a path border with logs and wooden stakes
• sawing lots of fire wood
• building and lighting a fire
• preparing cinnamon and sugar apples for the bonfire
• preparing loads of other random food items for the bonfire

Starting at the new path border, task owner Emma was telling everyone how to whittle the stakes into a pointy end so they would go into the ground easier. Val misheard entirely and thought someone was bringing steaks for the fire, she was bitterly disappointed.

Several small teams were tackling the big wooden ground stakes, digging huge holes around to extract them. Ed and Debs picked the biggest one and commandeered the sledgehammer - but we'll come back to them later.

Whilst all this stuff was happening, Leanne and a few other very committed runners boshed out some hill reps to make up for our run over not being very long. True dedication to the running cause.

Despite having extracted a huge pond liner on our previous visit, as the sand and silt got removed from the big pond area, we realised there were still several more liner layers underneath.

We're five layers in!

Debs and Ed had dug a really quite enormous hole around the stake, and we taking turns to whack it with the sledgehammer to try and shift it.

I think someone might be trying to dig out the other end of this stake in Australia!

The small pond was a much, much dirtier job. After pulling out loads of reeds, everyone was digging up sludge and sliding all over the place. Jo Mo in particular had managed to almost fall over several times and was covered in pond slime.

There's a rule at our flat. If you've been in the pond, you can't come in - Becky Mo

If a pond liner covered in liquid sludge wasn't tough enough to pull up, how about one covered with blocks of concrete, paving slabs and liquid sludge!? EJ even found an old spade in there, which everyone was delighted about because we needed more tools.

The clean team at the fire were doing a marvellous job; Ellie B and Angie managed to get the fire started using an old school bit of flint whilst everyone us had chopped loads of firewood, whittled teeny stakes for marshmallows and prepped all the food.

More people were gathering around the fire as their tasks finished, but the small pond crew wanted to battle on for as long as possible. Most of the stake removal crew had given up with their extractions, Pete was sawing off the stakes at the bottom of their holes and everyone else quickly filled the holes in. Ed and Debs point blank refused to use the saw and had created entirely new personalities for themselves.

He is Bawhack Obama and I am Captain Whack Sparrow

The stake reached a critical wiggle level and we all thought it was ready, but it held firm. After a few marshmallows though, they headed back and fuelled by sugar, they finally whacked it out of the ground - victory!

We celebrated a good night's work with lots of marshmallows, smores, nachos and err.. bacon. Apparently bacon on a stick is a thing.

Happy bonfire night everyone!