Hands on Heritage

The 26th-28th August witnessed the Lincolnshire Heritage at Risk project embark on our first young persons' residential trip - 'Hands on Heritage'.

The three day trip attempted to introduce a collection of 16 to 25 year olds to certain aspects of heritage that they might not usually get access to.

We collected the first group from Sleaford at about 9:30 on the Tuesday morning. I'm still not sure who was more nervous, us or them. The bus was, not surprisingly, unnervingly quiet. By the time we collected the second group from Lincoln there was a little bit of chat and by the time we picked up David, one of our younger Heritage Stewards, from Market Rasen quite a few conversations had developed. We arrived at Caenby on time and met David Rodger from BTCV who introduced us to the site and the principals of drystone walling. Lunch-time quickly followed alongside a short debriefing from staff (introductions, ice-breakers and, most importantly, rules for the week). It was then straight into it; a couple making hearting stones, some applying the capping stones, a few helping form the foundations and several of us organising the stones into nice neat rows for the wallers. Out of all the tasks it seemed that they were most enthusiastic about making the hearting stones. This involved smashing large lumps of rock with a hammer; quite similar to hard-labour or slaves working in an ancient quarry. Anyway, a young persons' appetite for destruction made sure the hearting kept flowing.

The evening at our youth hostel in Claxby involved an indoor barbecue (otherwise called cooking in the oven) and a walk through the woods, rounded off with a quiz and a video. By this time everybody had started to get to know each other quite well which meant some lengthy chats going on well into the night.

A quick breakfast then it was off to Tupholme Abbey (a site managed by the Heritage Trust of Lincolnshire.) The group was split into 3 so that they could experience building recording, finds processing and earthwork surveying - lots of new skills for all. Despite the all the sheep poo it was a fantastic day enjoyed by all. The only problem was with my newly shaven head and the resultant sun-burn; I'm still peeling! Back at Claxby it was pizza making (well, just adding toppings, no dough tossing) quickly followed, before it got dark, by rocket making. The rockets all carried eggs and were to be launched via the power of water and compressed air. Unfortunately I think I might have added too much water to the rockets which resulted in a failure to launch.

The last day involved a trip to the local high ropes centre; a bit of a 'treat' for the kids and the staff. The first course was about 8 feet off the ground, a way of getting use to the equipment. This was a bit too much for some as they declined the option to go for the 12 feet high section (it felt much higher than 12 feet - if you add my own height I guess my eyes were nearly 18 feet off the ground so it looked a long way down.) A few of the more nerveless ones took up the challenge of the tower and the trapeze, I declined both as I didn't want to show-off in front of the youngsters. After all the excitement we conducted a feedback session where we were told what had been learnt, what they enjoyed, what they didn't enjoy (very little fortunately) and if they would recommend the trip to their friends. All the feedback was very positive so it looks like we will be doing another one next year. Watch this space.

A selection of photos can be viewed at the Lincolnshire Heritage at Risk Facebook page. More will be appearing soon on our new website www.lincshar.org

Michael, Heritage at Risk Project Officer