It turned out that the week we had chosen to work on the rope guide coincided with the first week of archeological excavations on the site of the Roman fort and medieval village that surrounds the church. When we arrived for our leisurely start we found that our sleepy rural environment was inundated with parked cars. Fortunately the "diggers" had respected the Rectors parking space, so we squeezed two cars in there and made a mental note to protect our territory overnight with cones.
Predictably we began with a coffee break and discussion about where to start. There followed a great deal of carrying strengthening rods up and down the scaffold tower to check lengths and measurements. Both rods were found to be a bit too long but a lucky chance meant that the rod which was meant to fit the east
side of the chamber actually fitted the west side, so only one of them had to be re-cut.
By lunch time the rod had been cut to the right length, the remaining holes had been drilled in the rods and the positions of all the brackets had been marked. The exciting task of drilling eight holes in granite would begin after lunch. In something of a traditional move Sue ended up driving to Trewartha's in Callington for additional materials, so she decided to test the idea of putting out a cone to protect her parking place. She hadn't got back into her car before a friendly neighbourhood "digger" had driven over the cone. Worse still he turned out to be one of our own amazing helpers - a turncoat, how shocking!
The eight holes turned out to be much easier than had been expected, Kev's sharp drill bit cut through the granite like a hot knife through butter and in next to no time we were ready to move on. The next stage was to fill the drill holes with a chemical fixer and then insert the bolts, these would become bonded to the wall giving greater support to the strengthening rods.
By late afternoon all the bolts were in place and one bracket had been roughly set up just to prove it would all work. The day ended with another cup of coffee and plans for the next days work.