25th October 2018
With Alex, Nick, Jonathon, Mike, Duncan and David Walker (curator at the Wells & Mendip Museum and MCRA)
At the sand dig we were relieved to see it had dried-up and quite quickly after the fill event by the look of it. I started to dig in the [dry] alcove, because I got there first, Alex reduced a limestone boulder in size and removed the slop from the lowest point of the dig. The spoil management team were not impressed with the slop and were experiencing some difficulty in extricating it from the bucket. The solution, they decided, was to put a couple of handfuls of drier sediment into the bucket first, the diggers, of course, complied with this instruction.
Nick was on the steps passing the filled buckets to David, loading the skip to the spoil management team comprising Jon, Mike and Duncan.
When Alex had removed the slop, he turned his attention to clearing the loose sediment that I was creating in the alcove. The buckets started to move freely at a good constant rate. There are some very interesting layers of deposition to look at in the sediment bank, these can become, somewhat, of a distraction. Flood events and subsequent drying periods can be clearly distinguished.
All too soon it was time to stop digging, clear the loose, stash the tools at a safe height and make our way out of the cave. Changed in the car park and up to the Hunter’s for well-earned refreshments.
