Starting to replace the sleepers

My garden has raised beds, and they are demarcated by railway sleepers. Some show clear signs of actual use. Interestingly, some are normal gauge and some are narrow gauge. I like the historic reference; the narrow gauge quarry railroad would have passed by at some 750 m distance to the Southwest; the normal gauge passenger railroad would have started some 350 m to the west. But some of the sleepers we are quite rotten. What to do with that? Replace them with newer sleepers? Or do something entirely different?

As much as I like the historic reference, I do not quite like the rigid geometry. I'm not one for clean straight lines. So I decided that every sleeper that had become to rotten would be replaced by stones from the riverbed. And I have started! One of my very small raised beds really needed a new western edge. So I threw the remnant of the sleeper away, and lugged some big stones from the riverbed into position. For now I only place to them they're; I will have to dig them in to make them more solid. But the change has started! There are already two more sleepers that can do with replacement. And one of my raised beds already was stone lined; stones are clearly the new sleepers! I wonder how many I will get to replace before I have to pass this garden on to someone else…

Before

After

Election? What election?

There were elections coming up. And I always vote! I am only too aware of all the people in space and time who do not have this privilege. I have it; I want to use it. So with these local elections looming, I thought I'd have a look at the candidates, as one does. And then I got confused.

I found the candidates alright; but it was a list of candidates per ward. One assumes you have to vote within your own ward. But there was only one name there! Was I missing something? Or was it just uncontested? I asked a local British friend and he hadn't had a look yet. And then a letter came through the door. It confirmed the elections in my village indeed were uncontested, so there was no point in letting them take place.

I know new what I was up for, but it was a bit disappointing. I suppose counsellor is the sort of job no one wants to do. Once someone has been convinced of taking it upon themselves, everybody else does a step back. I think there is something wrong with the system if this is happening all through the town. But I'm not standing either! Not that I know if I could, by the way, me being a foreign citizen and all. Maybe I should look it up. My aim is to have more time at some point; it would be good to do something for the community with some of that!

An election in three documents: polling card, candidates (one per ward), letter that renders the polling card redundant

Trying bark to stop the cats

My cat shits in my garden. The neighbour’s cat shits in my garden. There might be more cats that shit in my garden. And that's OK; we all have to shit somewhere. But I'd like to steer a bit where exactly they go. And I decided to do an experiment. You can buy decorative treebark in the garden centre, and spread it out over your raised beds. I suppose it is mainly against weeds, but it might very well work against cats as well.

I had already had the bark for a while, but I had not got around to spreading it. And one day I did. I first took out all the weeds out of the bed I had civilised the year before, and then I spread out the bark. Now I'll have to wait and see what the effect is! Maybe they will just dig through it. One way to find out… the first few days, at least, it looked conspicuously tidy!

Cat taking liberties

Bark in the bed

Dinner for six! Or four…

Through the winter, we had been meeting up for dinners with a group of five friends. It should be six! But person number six, Siobhan, was somewhere on the southern hemisphere. She came back in February. We had already met up a few times, but she hadn't been to my house yet or met my cat. I had been mentally preparing for having five guests over. It is an unusually high number! But I'm sure my house can fit that. So I suggested a date for dinner at my place. Some discussion followed and we settled on 22 April. And I knew I would have to cook quite some food! Tom (Siobhan's partner) is infamous for being able to consume quite a lot. But at least the choice of dishes was wider now than the previous time I cooked for this company, as everyone was eating cheese again.

I decided I was going to make two quiches, and add tomato salad for reasons of colour. Susan had offered to sort dessert. So on the day, I set to work. I decided to blind bake the quiche crusts. That way you know for sure that they are properly done when you serve the quiche! I had never done this before, but it worked. 

The day before I had already switched the boiler back on. It is okay for me to live without central heating, but I don't want to do that to guests! And I got everything ready on time. I managed to cobble together enough crockery and cutlery to make it work for six. I don't have a co-ordinated set that big! But with some odd additions I reached the numbers. And I was just having a few minutes of reading the newspaper in the sun before people would appear. And then my phone pinged. It was Siobhan, saying "this is where I'm really hoping we did say we weren't around yes?!" I didn't expect that. She quoted the WhatsApp message where Tom had indeed indicated they were busy. But on the same note, Dean had indicated he would be washing his hair this very night. As there were no objections to the date I had assumed it was as flippant a remark as the one about Dean's hair. But now it turned out it had been serious! Oh dear.

A minute or two later the others appeared, they were also a bit disappointed. But well, you can have a lovely night with four people! And it would just mean we would have a lot of food left over. I probably wouldn't have to cook the entire rest of the week…

We first had a beer and some nibblies in the garden. It was a lovely early evening! But then we went indoors for dinner. We managed to eat exactly half of the quiche offering. And roughly two thirds of dessert.

A lot of quiche for four people

We then retired to the living room where we lit a fire. It was that time of year where both a fire and drinking beer in the sun make sense! And a lovely evening was had. I'll just have to try again to get the complete sextet to my house!

End to second iteration of side gig

My last session of the climate course is about what individuals can do. There is a lot you can say about that; you can go into how one can save energy, or how one can make sure that the energy used is as sustainably sourced as possible. But I also talk about what science has said about the efficacy of climate protest, and how it has fared people who have taken governments to court for being insufficiently proactive on the climate front.

The session was good. I really liked my participants! And then, a bit after 9 PM, I closed the Zoom meeting. The second iteration of my climate course was done! I filed the pay claim right away. Having done this course twice is still not enough to buy even one solar panel. This is not a way of getting rich! But it has been good.

In a few days, I will see my contact person again and we can talk about what's next. She has some ideas and I am curious to hear them. Although I am also happy that for now, I only have one job. One that I can do better now after having taught in a different way as well!

Birthday hike for Kate

I had two nights where I didn't have any obligations in the week that Kate was around. So we decided spend both of them somewhere beautiful. The first night we had visited a bothy I didn't previously know about. The second night we would go to a bothy I had seen several times before, but never spent the night in. It was also not very far from civilisation; that was good because I needed to do some work, and I also was tired after our first adventure which had been followed by a cave rescue session. Kate had said there would be three of us this time; a lady she had been on the ship with would join us. I hope she wouldn't be too disappointed at the somewhat understated hike I had suggested!

I also wanted to prepare a bit as I knew that on the second day it would be her birthday. I wanted to make that a bit special! I decided to bring cake, a candle, and some more whiskey. The local supermarket had a gift set of three tiny bottles of Penderyn whisky; I knew that good stuff, so I bought these. And I quickly made a chocolate cake. Packing the bag didn't take much time; I could leave some of it packed as it was.

I arrived at her place at the agreed time. We would then car share to Cwm Eigiau. I met Bee (short for Belinda), put my dinner in my bag (Kate had bought some hike meals in town), changed into my shorts, and made a cup of tea for myself and Bee. The others are still packing. But after not too much time we were ready to set off. Kate drove us to the parking lot where there was space for us. And then we could set off! Bee first took a picture of our three bags; mine was a lot bigger as Kate had asked me to bring my tent. This bothy was in much more busy terrain so it could be full. Not very likely, but possible. And I didn't mind; it was a short walk with not that much height gain. And it was a beautiful day!

Start of the walk

We took it easy. We were not in a hurry and the landscape was beautiful. And Bee and I had to get to know each other a bit. She was lovely! And we saw little figures by the bothy from the other side of the valley; we were glad we had a tent. We couldn't tell how many there were. It took us a while to get to the first reservoir. From there, the second reservoir is really close. And that bothy is quite close to that.

First break; pic by Bee

I can see why they were making jokes about the bag. Pic by Kate. 

The second reservoir

When we got there, we met the person in the red jacket we had seen from a distance. He was called Stuart (Stewart?) and he was there on his own. We had a nice chat with him while having a good look at the bothy. I was glad the ladies liked it! It wasn't anywhere near as spectacular as the previous one, but it was a lot cleaner and more comfortable. And not spooky.

Living room of the bothy; pic by Kate

Bedroom; pic by Kate

We then sat outside to drink some birthday whiskey; all four of us. On her actual birthday, Kate would have to drive. And after a while we cooked dinner. We cooked and ate it outside, even though again it was getting cold. And after dinner we had the birthday cake with the candle. We also welcomed two additional people; two climbers.

Whisky in the sun

Birthday cake; pic by Bee

Multitasking; cooking while droning. Pic by Bee

After dinner we went indoors, and even lit a small fire. It was very snug! But we are all bit tired so we didn't go to bed too late.

Kate tends to the fire

Snug! Pic by Kate

I struggled to sleep because this bothy was so much warmer than the other one. I also went to the loo; I wasn't sure if it was necessary but it is always lovely to briefly be outside under the starry sky. And it was!

I woke up absurdly late by my standards; it was almost 7:30. I got up and started breakfast. It was already quite warm! It was very pleasant to have our porridge in the sun. The climbers were already gone, and Stewart was on his way quite soon as well. I hope he had a lovely day hike! We packed our stuff and then we as well were ready to leave. We had decided we would not retrace our steps; we would go back to what yesterday had been the first reservoir, and from there bushwhack it to the ridge, and then down the ridge on the other side to the path. And so we did! The terrain was quite okay. And on the other side we first explored some mining ruins.

Bothy in morning light

And in context

Break on the ridge. Pic by Kate

Bushwhacking to the ridge

Slate industry ruins in Cwm Eigiau

Walking back to the car was beautiful but uneventful. And then we went back home! And we had lunch there. After lunch I said my goodbye and went home again. I needed to get ready for the last session in my climate course! And I trusted Bee would be capable of making Kate's rest of her birthday enjoyable.

Near the reservoir; pic by Kate

I was quite tired now, it was amazing to have done not one but two adventures that week. When an opportunity presents itself, you had better take it! Especially if it is a friend's birthday. Even more so if it is the birthday of a friend who has in the past made your birthdays lovely. But even without birthdays; I don't know when the next time will be I will have people to do things like this with!

Comms training

It was time for another rescue training! And this value would practice our communication skills. We have several ways of communicating from underground. And it is important; being able to tell the surface you have found the casualty, and ask for whatever it is you need to get around safely, is crucial. So we need to keep skills updated.

We met at Great Orme. Tony, our communications officer, would lead the practice. When I rocked up the first thing I saw was a gleaming Go Below vehicle; Miles was there! I hadn't seen him the entire year. We didn't have to change as the idea was not to go beyond the tourist parts of the mine. I just grabbed my bag that contained my helmet, some water and an extra jumper. It was actually quite cold! And we had a bit of a chat, but soon we went indoors as that was more comfortable.

The first task was to communicate via Cavelink. If you place them close to each other, they don't need antennae to detect each other. So it was just us practising using them. And soon we indeed had a text exchange going. But now we needed to practice setting them up outside.

We started with the Cavelink. It was a bit dry outside! You normally try to put the ends of the antennae in a puddle of water, but there were no puddles. We just used pegs to connect them to the soil, of which we hoped there was enough moisture in it to transmit the signal. We tested the signal; it was poor. Oh dear. We chucked some water on the pegs. That helped a bit! Then we clipped the crocodile clips to the metal posts of a fence. These fence posts would undoubtedly reach deeper than our pegs! So a bit more chance to connect with soil moisture. That worked. We got our communication working. 

Now it was the turn of the Nicola. A Cavelink allows you to send text messages; a Nicola allows you to speak. It's a sort of underground walkie-talkie. We just connected the machine to the same antennae. That didn't work so well! We couldn't hear the other side. Some tweaking solved that in the end. But then we tried the next option, which is sort of the backup if nothing else works. First World War style field telephones! Just two telephones with a long cable in between. That worked. And by the time most people were really really cold. I had my cave jacket and my extra jumper, but some people were only in jumpers!

We tidied everything away again, and had a short debrief. And then we all went home again! It was still quite early, and we hadn't set a foot underground. It suited me fine! I was still tired from my brief adventure with Kate, and the next day I would have the next adventure already. And it was useful to be reminded of all three of these means of communication. And it had been a nice selection of people; only two Thursdaynighters, and I hadn't even been the only woman. And we had Miles! That doesn't happen very often…

Easter hike to nowhere

Kate was back in the country! And she had announced well in advance she would be up for adventures. She hoped we could do a multi-day hike. We had quite enjoyed the slate trail! But her week in Wales was a week where lots of other things were also taking place. I had a cave rescue training on the Tuesday and I had to teach my Quakers on the Thursday. So we decided we would try to go away on Monday night and Wednesday night!

For Monday night, Kate suggested a bothy I had never heard of. It was Cefngarw, that we could walk to from her house. It sounded fab! And it wasn't far. We could just leave after lunch and still make it before dinner. And that meant I had some time for work! 

I started packing my bag over the weekend. And I arrived as planned in time for lunch. We ate at her garden table, applied the last finishing touches to our luggage, and set off. Soon we were out of the village. I had considered the first part of the route before, for one of my nights away to get the cat used to my absence. Then I had reconsidered, but now I finally got to see it. And it was lovely! We walked on an old drovers’ road, that turned into a real road, which we then left. And the views only got better. 

The drovers' road

Double selfie

The landscape gets emptier

After a while we crossed the road through Ysbyty Ifan. The path continued on the other side through farmers’ fields. We met a farmer who said that the path did not continue as a public footpath beyond the farm, but we chatted a bit with him and then he said he wouldn't tell anyone if we continued our way anyway. So we did! Otherwise we would have had to go back to the road and follow that for a while.

The landscape gets even emptier

Soon after the farm, we really reached the totally empty landscape that characterises the area behind Penmachno. I love it! And after not too much time, we saw a chimney appear. The bothy! It stood there in the middle of nowhere. It was absolutely gorgeous. And when we got inside I was even more impressed. What a place! An old building where people rounding up sheep would spend the night. It was just two rooms; bedroom and living room, one presumes. We ignored the bedroom as there were only two of us. And the living room had a fireplace the size of a house (but we had no fuel), and spooky broken furniture, and a spooky grand piano of which about 20 keys made a sound. The floor was big slabs of slate. I loved it!

Almost there! Pic by Kate

Arenig Fach in the distance

The slightly spooky interior

Kate had brought her drone; she had already flown it a few times along the way. She now wanted to use the late light to fly a bit more in these beautiful surroundings. I went to get some water; the bothy wasn't quite next to the stream. And when I had water I went for a bit of a wash. Then it was time to cook dinner!

Kate had taken over a stove from someone she knew; it was allegedly broken. But we configured it and it worked flawlessly. She might now have a working stove for the rest of her life! A good deal. And soon we were having dinner. We managed to make ourselves reasonably comfortable on the broken furniture; the structure of the chairs and the bench was intact, so just an added plank as a seat was enough to make it usable. And then we sat outside for a bit, looking at the last rays of the sun touching Arenig Fach and Arenig Fawr in the distance. We also almost emptied a 5 cl bottle of whiskey I had brought. And we drank tea. But then it quickly got to bedtime. We made ourselves comfortable on the slate slabs.

In the beginning of the night I was a bit cold; I had brought my big sleeping bag so I didn't expect that. But I had clothes I could put on.

In the morning it was beautiful again. I got up and started to heat water. You can't have coffee early enough after getting up! We had a lovely alfresco breakfast, and then we packed up. I had to be back in time to meet a representative of the solar panel company that would have a closer look at my house that afternoon. We were ready to leave at 8 AM.

Making breakfast

Morning sun and mist

We had decided we would try to take a different route back. We would just bushwhack it to the road through Ysbyty Ifan, which we could do by just following the ridge with Cerrig Llwynogod and Cerrig Lladron, and then follow the road eastward until Llyn Cottage, where we would hit the path to Llyn Conwy. That went well; the terrain to the road was okay, and the road was (as expected) very quiet, and the path to the reservoir was excellent. Kate had warned me that skirting around the lake would be a bit less comfortable. And it was! It was the sort of hummocky terrain where you can sink half a metre into the vegetation. And from there we hoped it would be better. It started out not so bad while we were skirting the flank of Pen y Bedw, but when we tried to come down Llechwedd Oernant we were back in the awful vegetation that wasn't even traversed by sheep tracks. It was pretty trying. But we had time, so we had a last drone-flying break on the slope in which we could gather our strength for the last leg. I was really glad when we reached the river. On the other side of it there was an actual path! And that was already on the outskirts of Penmachno. Soon we were back at Kate's place. A lovely adventure!

Into nothing

Llyn Conwy

We had lunch together, again at the garden table, and then it was time for me to jump into the car again and go home. I was there in good time, and that was good as the solar panel man was early. It had been a lovely adventure, and I would love to go back to Cefngarw as it is incredibly beautiful there! But I will never again try the route we took on the way back…

Unexpected visit by Carol

When I posted a picture of my evening walk on Facebook, and old friend from Amsterdam responded. It was Carol, who had been a student while I had been PhD student, and she said she was in town. In town? She lives in London! What is the chance of her actually being in Bethesda! But she was. So we decided to meet up. And I thought my back garden would be a good venue. She agreed, and soon I gave her a hug and put the kettle on.

We had a nice cup of coffee and caught up about our current lives, and revisited the memories from our time in Amsterdam and her time in Bangor. She did a degree in Bangor before I arrived, and still has connections here, even though the friend she was now visiting was an old friend from London. The world is small! And I vaguely knew her friend. The world is smaller still.

When we had drunk our coffee she asked me what I intended to do with my day, and I said I wanted to paint the stairs into the garden. Carol asked if I wanted to hand with that. I did! So we painted the stairs together. And set the world to rights. And in the meantime I got hungry. I knew I only had enough bread for lunch for one person, so I said I might have to pop to the shop. Carol said she could make some naan bread. It sounded like an exciting option! So we put the paintbrushes away and went to the kitchen. I had never seen naan bread being made live. It doesn't look difficult; next time I could do it myself! And we gathered some things to have with the bread and went back to the garden.

I did not take pics when Carol was actually there, but this is what the stairs look like now!

After lunch she went back to her hosts. It had been great to catch up with her! I have an immaculately painted set of stairs. And new skills. I think she will be back! She certainly has more friends here in the small town than most Londoners do…

Easter break chores

During term time, I tend to not have much time for chores. So reaching the Easter break was the starting gun for catching up on stuff that I have been wanting to do for a while. Sometimes for months! And I got down to it. Most of it involved the garden; I sowed flowers and additional vegetables, both inside and outside; I repotted several vegetables, placed my peas outside, reseeded a bold patch in the grass, cut the existing grass, and contemplated some issues such as the compost heap. Some of it was not related to the garden; I for instance demolished another half pallet for firewood, and sorted out some practicalities for my impending solar panels.

The season for spending more time in the garden has clearly come, and it is nice to see it in what I think is a better state than it has ever been. There is still a lot of work to be done but with such a big garden it just takes time to get all of it under control. And more firewood will certainly come in handy! And the increasing tidiness of the garage as well. And the solar panels surely will. There is still a lot more to do but it is nice to make a dent in my to-do list!

Peas outside

Half a pallet on its way to become firewood

The big downstairs veg patch

Good Friday evening walk

On Good Friday I first had tutorial with one of my dissertation students. Some have been struggling a bit, hence the need for a tutorial on an unlikely date. But then I set about doing chores. But in the evening I decided to go for a walk. The weather had been forecast to be better than during the entire rest of the day. And I had decided to go into the direction of yr Elen; it's one of the local hills I haven't really sufficiently explored. So I had an early dinner and set off. It was just after 6 PM. And I decided to bike the first bit; I parked my bike in Gerlan and went into the valley of Afon Caseg. I wasn't sure if I could do the ridge. When I approached the flanks of yr Elen I decided I wouldn't have enough daylight; I opted for Braich y Llyngwn. And upon approaching it I saw that there were people camping right underneath it. It looked lovely! 

The beautiful valley! In full screen you can see the tents. And notice the ridge I chose which is the last bit of the hill in the sun. 

Afon Caseg

One approached me because he thought he had recognised me from a distance, but I wasn't the person he knew. Was nice to have a small chat though. 

I then clambered up the ridge. While I was doing that the moon came out. It was almost full! It was absolutely gorgeous but an iPhone can't really capture that. And the evening light on the hills was also stunning. I also saw that there was another cluster of tents higher up in the valley, where I had been camping two Easter ago myself. I had had the valley to myself but now there are no travel restrictions any more! The people in the valley could easily be English.

Carreg y Gath in evening light

The moon

The sun was fairly low when I was on the ridge, between yr Elen and Foel Ganol, and I knew it would be dark soon. I walked down the path back into the valley while occasionally stopping to take pictures of the setting sun. Still not something an iPhone is good that. But I sometimes stood still to just admire the view.

Low sun

Sun behind a rock

Distant view

I got back to the valley floor when it was already getting a bit dark. I knew there was no path, and I would be relying on sheep paths. It went okay though. I got somewhat wet socks, and clearly developed a blister on my toe, but that was a detail.

Sometimes I looked back. The moon was amazing above the hills, and there were clouds flowing over the ridge. Such a beautiful evening! I was glad I had done this.

Glorious night view

I got back to a public footpath and followed it. I knew it ran over the fields of a sheep farmer, and even though it was now fully dark the farmer was still doing things with his sheep. I hoped he was okay with me being there. I know there is a public full bath and I have the right to be there, but not all farmers welcome it very much. But he was really friendly and commented on how beautiful the evening was. He was right!

The path then led me straight past Sue and Dean's house. I thought it would be rude to walk past without knocking! So I knocked. And I had a nice small catch-up with Sue. Peas the cat also made an appearance but he was atypically unimpressed by my presence. Oh dear. Where has the romance gone? 

I then walked back to my bike in the blazing moonshine. Just before reaching my bike I met a cute kitten who was a lot more interested in my cuddles than Peas had been. Was that the universe apologising?

When I home it was time to have a quick shower, drink one flask of tea and then go to bed. It had been a good day!

Easter reached

Reaching Easter is always bit of a milestone. We get a three week Easter break, and after that there are generally only one or two weeks of teaching. These weeks don't tend to have lectures in them; it tends to be things like fieldtrips and student presentations. And this year is barely an exception. All the lectures are done, and most of what is still timetabled in what this year is three weeks of teaching is indeed either student presentations or days in the field.  The presentations are for all the big cohort-wide modules; the first year tutorial module, the second year science communication module, the third year dissertation module and the fourth year project plan and literature review module. The fieldtrips are for two different modules. And I hope to get out on the small boat to go sampling with my master student. I am slightly nervous as our sampling site is a reasonable distance from the School, and my stomach is quite sensitive to small boats. But we'll see!

This year it wasn't too difficult to get there, but it was still nice to do so. And this Easter break I will also do the last lecture of the current lecture series of my side gig.

The fieldtrips and student presentations won't require an enormous amount of preparation, and assume this they are done the exam period starts. And then it is time to start preparing for next year! I have quite some work to do on our fieldwork module, and on a serious start of my Welsh teaching. Enough to do! But it has been an reassuringly doable end of the lecturing season...

Sort out pallets

Once upon a time, someone in my neighbourhood had something big delivered. It came in three pallets, nailed together, and wrapped in plastic. Whoever it was and whatever it was that was delivered, the person left the packaging by the side of the road. But the council will not pick something like that up.

I decided to take the pallets apart. I don't like fly-tipping! And I know that it is not unusual for someone to ask on the village Facebook group if someone has some pallets. I could just wait for that to happen and then get rid of them again! But nobody put in a request, as far as I noticed. So one day I decided that something needed to be done. And I decided to chop one up for firewood. It was painted, but well, what can one do.

When I had separated the three pallets, I had been a bit dismayed at how many nails the people had used who had fixed them together. And those people would in all likelihood be different people from those who had made the regional pallets. But I was soon to find out they had the same outlook on life. Whoever had made these pallets did not do sparing use of nails! It was a right pain to separate the various planks and blocks. The sawing into chunks was not much of a problem, but getting the nails out of these planks was a bit of a challenge as well. I decided this was just not very efficient use of a pallet. So I soon as I had chopped it up I became proactive, and actively advertised the remaining two (plus an unrelated smaller pallet) on the village Facebook page. And someone immediately responded! They wanted all three. And they lived a bit further east on the high street.

I pondered fixing them to my bike, but I didn't think it would work well. Then I pondered my dolly, and decided that was a better idea. I just stood all three pallets on the dolly; they just stood there quite stably. Then I strapped them to it with a ratchet strap. Ready to go!

Getting the whole construction to the road was bit interesting as the slopes were steep and the ground uneven. But if I could do this bit, I could do the rest as well!

I got them to the high street. All was well except some drainage gutters in the pavement. But I managed to negotiate them! And when I was beyond halfway there, I met a woman on the pavement, and she spontaneously offered to help. That was kind! The rest was a doddle.

When we got to the house I thought was our destination she said "that's Donna's house!" And it had indeed been a woman called Donna who had wanted the pallets. We were at the right address! So we wheeled them into the front garden and said goodbye. The lady introduced herself as Megan and vanished. She had been kind!

I took the strap off and wondered if I should knock. But I figured that if anyone would be home they would have heard me by now. And I had somewhere to go. The lady had suggested I just leave them in the front garden so I took my dolly and walked back.

I have no idea what their new role will be. I hope they will remain pallets! They certainly are sturdily built. And I now have some firewood that smells a bit funny thanks to the paint, and a lot more space in the garage!

Big pallets a bit in the way

Put together with more nails than I appreciate

One is in bits!

Firewood now. Pity about the paint. 

The other three strapped to a dolly, ready to leave!