Great help from members: Heather Driscall, Max Driscall, John Castick, Dave Wylie, Dave Shotton, Mark Garrod,

Sue Marsden, John Cox, Laura Bond, Tim Howarth, Kate Harvey and prospective member Joe Steed.

I arrived on Friday evening to find everyone already in attendance and set to making the soup for the next day. It was nice to see folk who had said they were coming and a pleasant surprise to see a few more who I hadn’t been expecting.  It was also a good opportunity to meet and put names to faces.

We had a relatively early start on the Saturday and the weather was better than forecast. Not being sure how long it would stay in our favour outside jobs were prioritised: so John Cox and Joe set to on the paths and gorse bashing, to be joined later by Max; Dave S did the repairs to the front door; Tim made a start on the windows to the rear of the hut and jobs that could be, were taken outside to be completed, ie, Sue and Laura stripped the pillows and put both anti- allergy slips and new/clean pillow cases on all.

Heather tackled the mammoth task of cleaning all the pots, pans, crockery, cutlery and utensils and putting them back on freshly de-grimed shelves and cupboards.  She was ably assisted throughout the day by folk who mucked in between other jobs… a cracking team effort.

Lunch was a sociable affair and it was nice to have a break and a catch up.  The homemade lemon drizzle cake and brownies were well received and I had intended to use them as bribery but that wasn’t necessary as everyone was enthusiastic and willing anyway!  After lunch saw folk back at it again and Mark having already spent the morning cleaning the Gents took on another unsavoury job, that of clearing around the KMC bin in the lane.  Dave W continued the pointing in the gas store and cleaned it out. Meanwhile Kate started painting the women’s toilets and I carried on scraping the remainder of the flaking paint in one of the cubicles and then helped her paint.

John Castick attended to various jobs and was always on hand to advice or to source the right tools and equipment.  And so thanks to so many willing helpers who turned up to Ty Powrdr to give it some much needed TLC and a thorough spring clean, (too many jobs done to give individual name checks!).  Everyone did a cracking job and special thanks to: Kate for helping me finish off the painting on the Sunday, Mark for the ELBOW DEEP clean of the drain in the men’s toilet, above and beyond Mark, and Joe for attending a working party meet, having been on his first meet ever only the week before.

Working Party Meet, Friday 22nd – Sunday 24th February ‘19

Ask not what can your club do for you but what you can do for your club!

Do you enjoy visiting the hut and its beautiful environs? Do you like to see the hut spick and span? Do you think it could be spicker and spanner? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then would you like to join me and others helping to give our fab hut some TLC? 

It’s probably a bit to early in the year to be a genuine 'spring clean’ but that is basically what this, the first working party of the year, will be about. There are no onerous tasks, here’s a taster of what we’ll be doing: 

Painting - the women’s toilet cubicles and some of the outside of the windows 

Sealing tiles in the women’s shower 

Replacing batteries in the appropriate appliances and testing alarms

There will be some scrambling about on the loft identifying and photographing where there is render loss

Changing pillow cases in the dorms

Strimming along the path and out front

Clearing drains and ditches along the path

Tidying and re-ordering the storeroom

Washing pots, pans and utensils in the kitchen

And cleaning throughout

So, nothing too taxing there! In return for all your efforts lunch will be provided on the Saturday, your stay at the hut is free stay and I’ll bake a cake. I’ll also bring some games for the evening and then Sunday is your own to wander, climb and explore as you please. Are you interested? Please let me know so I can provide enough cake! Many hands make light work and the more the merrier!

Cheers

Philippa