At Clydach Lock we were met by  the visible effects of yesterday’s very high winds. Fallen leaves, washed down the canal in their thousands, were banked up against the stop planks while the bywash was completely blocked.  As  a result the water level had increased alarmingly and was flooding the planks of the scaffolding  in the lock. First job was to clear the leaves (above) before we started work on the new sleepers.

Ater the Old Highways Depot site, the main aim was to erect more Heras Security Fencing and then concrete in large wooden poles for the acccess gates to the private land at the top of the site. Here is Gordon drilling into the concrete to get a big enough hole for the posts.

Aided by Toby and Gareth the posts were finally in place. We are close now to tarmaccing the new towpath.

By this time, Clydach Lock was also ready for action and Rhodri and Bob drilled holes into the sleepers for the bolts to be put in. Then Bob thumped the bolts into the wood with his sledge hammer.

All the sleepers along the whole length of the chamber weree fixed to the timbers below by this method and we then backfilled behind the sleepers.

Next week we need to lime mortar the sleepers to the top stones of the chamber and we can then move on to repoinitng the chamber itself.