Today sees 45 to 50 volunteers onsite at Borrowash, In addition to the Waterways Recovery Group Volunteers, the Trust’s regular Wednesday morning work party we are pleased to welcome a team of about 15 from the Friends of Cromford Canal.

In addition to replacing the large stone blocks work continues on rebuilding the wing wall below the lock. Perhaps the biggest challenge of the day was the arrival of 6 cubic meters of ready mixed concrete that had to be offloaded within 30 minutes. A massive effort by volunteers manning the wheelbarrows to distribute the concrete to several locations onsite to back-fill stonework already rebuilt. Fortunately the concrete lorry was able to reverse two thirds of the way along the track to the lock chamber reducing the distance of the manual transportation.

Trust volunteers have assisted with pointing of the stone work and clearance of vegetation; the latter task being greatly assisted by Friends of Cromford Canal; who also assisted with the movement of the concrete.

Late morning the BBC’s Quentin Rayner arrived with his camera man to capture a news piece, hopefully to be broadcast on this evening’s East Midlands BBC News, which will bring much needed publicity.

Thank you to all the volunteers.