The Grand Boardwalk Project has Started!

But first lets play eye spy to try and find these little busy bodies of the coast.  Four Turnstone

So this was how the start of our boardwalk looked before.  The vegetation had grown over and the slippy wooden boards had warped

Using a mattock we were able to prise the old board away from the rotten runner below, leaving a level bed of sand underneath.

We lay new recycled plastic runners down in place of the old wooden ones.  This time we used 6 in order to build a stable platform less likely to bend as demonstrated by our old boards.

First a pilot hole was drilled through the board, then the hole was drilled with a countersink bit in order for the screws to sit tightly below the surface to prevent any trip hazards.  Due to the nature of using plastic, we had to carefully allow 1cm spacing between each board in order for the plastic to expand and contract in the changing weather conditions

The runners were drilled through and attached using a coach bolt.  This just prevents the boards moving away from each other

The tools of our trade, includes three drills as it saves time changing bits.

The story so far...come back and see more from the remainder of our project soon

After the storm came the floods...

Friday 3rd January saw a 9.97meter high tide with South Westerly winds of 48mph.  This meant that the Southern parts of our reserve that is often protected by Walney Island experienced mass flooding.  In this area we have 19 privately owned fishing huts which were all engulfed with waves, many reaching up to the windows even though they are all on stilts.  Here is the footage...