Day 11, progress and brewing

I've just posted a short piece on Living in Sanity Again about problems with a particular boat builder. Those thinking of commissioning a new boat should have a look at it as a warning of the need to choose a reputable company.

Meanwhile, the work went on on the site and in the car park:

Bees as well as wasps

 In addition to the wasps nest, a bee hive was found. Both have been dealt with, though the bees didn't need much intervention as I understand it.

Almost done

The grassy area is pretty well sorted, although some tidying of the edges is still needed:

Cleaning up the edge.

Meanwhile, work continues on the mini Alps:

Increasing area of flat stuff

 but there's quite a bit to do:

Untouched heap

They're working at it non-stop, using all the skilled telehandler drivers available, including our resident professional, Site 3, aka Mike Sumner. The Merlo suffered a puncture at one stage, but was soon repaired and back in action.

In the evening, 20 of us went on a complimentary brewery tour at Marston's. Fascinating; I've seen round this brewery before, but each tour adds a bit of new info.

Original grist mill

 We started in the original, Grade II listed building, looking at things that were still in use 6 years ago. Brewing is a very traditional business.

Hearing about the old mash tun

The liquid produced by mashing the ground malt or grist is passed into a copper for hopping and boiling. It's called a copper because...

Peering into the copper

...it's made of copper. Here's what the modern one looks like:

Stainless steel copper

Though even these are over thirty years old. Marston's still uses the Burton Union system of brewing for Pedigree Bitter and for the Bass they brew under licence from InBev. Other beers are brewed in modern(ish) closed fermenters.

The "Cathedral of Brewing"

The Union ssytem is an ingenious way of separating the yeast from the brew at the end of fermentation.

Inside a closed fermenter.

The unions weren't working when we saw them, it was too early in the week, but we saw inside a closed fermenter. This is what Burton Bitter looks like when in mid ferment. That brew was going to be bottled, and we had a fascinating overview of the enormous bottling line.

This line is capable of bottling 40,000 bottles  – an hour

I could have stood and watched it for hours, except that free samples were waiting in the Visitor Centre!

Day 10 and the car park

Good stuff to report first; the Race Evening was a resounding success, with a lot of money made for the Inglesham Lock Appeal. We don't have the final total yet, but it's certainly into four figures from what we understand.

Yesterday, the weather settled into a warm and dry state, which is excellent for most purposes, but hard on the wrg team haymaking in the car park.

On with the photos:

Good start, long way to go

 Bit like the car park, really (see below)

Michael Caine was here?

 Was the evening so good they blew the bloody doors off? No, the Environmental Health Officer didn't like the glass doors, and wanted fire doors:

Sleeping Accommodation Doors

...like these ones.

Digger's start

Digger did a bit over half an hour on the rock pile on Saturday night, nearly missing dinner, he was enjoying himself so much. He managed to get this bit done.

Some of it's gone

 Later in the day, the first pile had had its end cut off by Phil and RAF Martin taking it in turns in the Merlo telehandler.

Phil at work

Part of the problem is that the bucket is a grain bucket, not an excavator bucket. Progress would be a lot faster if we hired in some more appropriate plant, like an excavator and a couple of 360° dumpers, all of which wrg are well used to using.

The Haymakers

 Meanwhile, other wrgies toiled on in the sun. They said they felt like something out of one of those recreation of the past telly programmes.

Hauling it away

The hay was piled on tarpaulins and hauled off to the sides of the area, being careful not to make the heaps too big. We don't want spontaneous combustion...

What we did get was spontaneous sprinting, however, when "Hurricane Bob" Metcalfe put his brushcutter through a wasps nest.

View from commercial gate

Another case of 'well on the way, but some distance to go'. The marquee guys are still shoving canvas up all over the place. It all has to be done by Thursday, when the traders come in.

Hotting up on day 9

The pace is beginning to hot up. Sheila and I had a chance to meet Karen (hi Karen) who's been doing a brilliant job of the PR for the Festival. A good example of that is a broadcast by Radio Derby, featuring Harry Arnold, the event chairman, and Jenny off Tom Tug, the boat behind us. You can hear the broadcast here; fast forward to the two hour mark. Part two is on Monday.

Karen was around to meet up with Harry and arrange a group photo. Harry is a long time waterway restorer, hire yard operator and most especially waterway photographer, trading as Waterway Images. Here's the photo he took, but note well that he retains the copyright for it, not I:

Many of the volunteers

Elsewhere, things got busier and busier, as the wrg camp gets into full swing and the opening day draws closer.

Checking kit

 As each wrg kit trailer arrives, it is entirely unloaded and the kit checked off against a list, so that any losses can be attributed to the right camp.

Wrg1/Site1 conference

Meanwhile, Al the wrg leader had a planning meeting with Moose, Site Director, well away from the hurly burly. Later in the day, these picnic tables were repainted by a Community Payback team.

Signs at work

 The vinyl for the signs is cut in the cabin I showed yesterday, but the actual assembly takes place in a corner of the wrg marquee.

Entry to the wrg compound

 And here's one they made earlier.

Forks training

Elsewhere in the wrg compound, Digger, who is a professional plant handler, did a training session on the use of the telehandler. Anyone who wants to use a piece of wrg plant, whether owned or hired in, has to have been trained and issued with a Driver Authorisation ticket.

And if this doesn't work, I'll fetch a bigger hammer...

 It's usually  the red shirts who find themselves having to redo a piece of work because Site 1's changed his mind, but this time the waterspace team caught themselves out. Repositioning some of the workers' boats meant that the landing stages were in the wrong place, and had to be extracted and reinstalled. (My thanks to Martin the American for the photo.)

For removal

Strimming continued in the car park and, later in the afternoon, this fence panel was removed to allow the forks in to start moving those heaps of hardcore. Digger got stuck in with enthusiasm, and had to be persuaded to give it up in time to take part in the Race Night. This was an event to raise money for the Inglesham Lock Appeal. We didn't make it ourselves, Race Nights not being our scene, but hopefully I'll get a report on it from others today.

Sunny day 8

The weather showed distinct signs of improvement yesterday, and the forecast is good for this weekend. Sheila went off to help with some promotion of the event at the Octagon shopping centre in Burton. She spent the morning there, and reported a good level of interest, which is encouraging.

It meant that I was free to wander the site with camera and radio around my neck, and these are some of the results:

Whose car?

This car drove by and on down to Personnel. I wondered briefly who had the fancy registration, then spotted Clive Henderson, the National Chairman, in Admin talking to Sandy.

His!

Just a little later, there he was again, helping to carry a table into Personnel. See, he is good for something! ;)

Testing, testing

 The sparks team under Bungle were testing some reserve cable he had fetched from storage at North Cheshire Cruising Club. Because it's been out of use for a few years, it all had to be tested for earth leakage and the like before being deployed.

Can you see what it is yet?

Meanwhile, the chippies were repositioning the sign on top of Commercial. As originally erected, it wasn't visible from the vehicle entrance, which rather misses the point. It's a bit better now, but is also leaning back a bit, so that visiting helicopters will be able to spot it...

The skips

 These are the rubbish skips, and a recycling bank ...

Where?

and this is the view of them from the nearest point of the main site. I try to be positive about everything, because I want lots of folk to come to the Festival, but readers of my other blogs will know that I believe in telling it like it is, so this is my first moan of the day! The skips are in the picture, honest, but right at the far end of the road running up the middle of the shot.

Martin strimming

And this is my other worry today. The Americans spent the afternoon strimming in the main car park. You can see the scale of the problem, and that's the easy bit. I have two concerns: firstly, getting this area ready in time (I'm sure it will be, we've got 80 wrgies arriving over the next two days) and secondly whether it will be big enough. It's normally estimated that we need 25 acres of car park, and I don't think we've got it this year.

There will also be a free shuttle bus from the town centre, and that may well be the answer for anyone local. I should explain that it's not entirely the Festival team's fault. Burton Council did offer to find car parking space, but were in the event unable to do so.

Watch this space, as they say.

Finally:

Guess who?

We have a very effective signs making team, using cut vinyl stuck onto Correx board. Naturally, their cabin has the best sign. But round the back:

Last years signs

It's not quite so tidy!

See you tomorrow.

Day 7

The work goes on, the weather holds. Site 1 (Moose) said to me (and I quote exactly) "I don't like it, it's too quiet". Think he's been watching too many old Westerns again...

The main activity has been on the part of the marquee guys, steadily putting up canvas all over the show ground. Late in the day, Moose's concerns were partly justified when the genny supplying Admin village and the Tardis compound hiccuped for a while, and then died. Emergency supplies were sorted to get us through the night, and a repair or replacement should be happening as I type this.

I also had a chat with Moose about the use of wrg forestry, or non-use rather. He said that he did look at getting a wrg team in, but the timing just wasn't right. There's a narrow window for this sort of work (before the birdies start nesting) and a wrg camp just couldn't be done.

I guess that's the other side of the volunteering coin; unlike contractors, you can't just summon a volunteer team when you want them.

This blog continues to attract positive tweets and the like; my thanks to those who do so. Meanwhile, Towpath Talk has drawn attention to a reshowing of the BBC2 programme, The Golden Age of Canals, tonight at 9pm.

Now for a few more photos:

Two thirds of the IWA marquee

 The biggest marquee will be that occupied by the IWA, as you'd expect. It will be visible as you come in through the main entrance.

Wrg eating marquee ready for action

 30 trestles are now installed, so we should be able to accommodate everyone.

Driving a peg

Anyone who's ever struggled to put a mooring pin in will look at this machine with envy. It drives the 30" long marquee pegs with little effort, but a lot of noise. At knock down, the beast can even be used in reverse to pull them out again.

Blacking out the sleeping marquee glass

 Every year, they fit the sleeping marquee with glazed doors. Last year, I did manage to get them to change them for solid ones, but this year it was decided just to fix black out material over the glass.

Commercial cabin

 Here it stands, all sad and alone, by the exhibitors' vehicle entrance. Come the day, there will be a marquee front to it, and it will be heaving with activity.

Plumbers' Fire Service

Seems a long time since the plumbing team got a mention, so here they are collecting the biggest step ladder on site, preparatory to climbing another tree.

Many thanks to all who sent us good wishes for our anniversary yesterday. In the end, we went to the Albion on Shobnall Road, an easy walk from the site. It's a Marston's chain pub, but the food was good, though only Pedigree was available from the cask, no guest beer that I could see.

Service was average; our starters came in good time, but then I think they forgot about us, and we had a long wait for our mains.

Day 6 and the work goes on

Today is our Ruby Wedding Anniversary. We're not planning any wild celebrations, just a trip out to the pub tonight. We'll maybe have a fancier meal later in the year, when we're somewhere a bit better supplied with fancy restaurants than Burton (it really is a pub town still).

Meantime, all I can say is that my life divides into two parts, the first 18 years before Sheila and I were together, and the last 43, including a long engagement at Uni, when we've been inseparable. I don't know what I did in the first 18 to deserve the last 43...

;)

There are no dramas to report from yesterday, just a satisfying level of progress, so I guess I'll let the photos do the talking again:

Motorised marking

This photo is a bit blurry, as it was taken from some distance by a phone camera; my thanks to Judy Hanchet for it. It shows Chris marking out the campsite with the aid of his wife's mobility scooter. That's not a moustache, by the way, it's a pen in his mouth.

Premier skeleton

The marquees are again being supplied by what's now Northern Event Structures. They are very good, and have a fast erection team. This is the skeleton of the Premier Marquee in place. By the end of the day it was covered and floored.

A lot of stuff happened in the wrg compound, getting it ready for the weekend's incursion of the main wrg camp.

Eating marquee

 The eating marquee is nearly ready, with all the trestle tables installed and covered in poly.

Adding the fridge annex

The kitchen cabin has an annex attached to the back, to hold the fridges and freezers. It's stored in flat pack form in the Tardis; here the guys are roofing it in heavy poly canvas.

Activity outside the eating marquee

 For many years, Moose was a leading red shirt. Quite rightly, he plays down the distinction between red shirts (wrgies) and blue (Festival volunteers) but strictly speaking he's a blue shirt these days, as Site Director. Some might say,therefore, that this is a typical picture, the red shirts in the background are working, and the blue shirt disguised as a red shirt in front is having a sit down.

Sleeping marquee

I can't remember another camp (and this is our eighth) where the sleeping marquee has been ready in such good time. It's been floored and carpeted, and all it needs now is the blown hot air heater installed.

Veg team take a break

They worked through to Horninglow yesterday. Here they are taking a break, well deserved in view of their efforts.

An example of the work

The householder whose garden is behind this tree has been asking BW to trim it back for him for years. They quoted him £800 to do it; it took the veg team maybe half an hour.

This raises an interesting question. In the early spring, the heavy scrub along the embankment where the workers' boats are tied had to be cleared off before the birds started nesting. BW gave IWA £600 towards the cost, and IWA then hired contractors at a cost of £1600 to do the work.

Wrg has a skilled forestry team, for whom this would have been a couple of weekends' work. Why weren't they used? That way, IWA could have kept the £600. I'll try and find out the answer (there may well be one, I just don't know it).

Horninglow basin

 This is where the Friday night Illuminated Parade will turn round, and good luck to 'em, say I. I could just about wind Sanity here, (she is 60'), but I wouldn't like to try the same with Sanity Again at 70.

Granny Buttons

This is the boat which has starred in so many blog posts by Andrew Denny. That space alongside is technically the winding hole and access to the service block. What you can't see is the bridge hole behind the camera that makes it amazingly difficult to swing into or out of the slot.

That's it for today; more tomorrow when I sober up ;).