I am on vacation this week and was able to make a rare Wednesday visit to Sheepscot. The mid-week volunteers were very busy today.
First thing, Stewart led a small crew to put down clean dirt and grade rainwater away from the west side of the restroom building. Hay was put down after to hold the soil in place. A rainstorm is expected tomorrow.
A ballast train was then assembled in the north yard for the trip north to the area of this past spring's work weekend trackwork south of Sutter's.
We unloaded the car and returned to Sheepscot. Upon return, a peek into bay 2 of the shop building revealed work is well underway on the first of two temporary steel spans that will be used to support the placement of the historic Moose Brook bridge later this year.
Fred said he was tired after the ballast train (he did quite of bit of the shovelling) and did not want to get a load of pine logs today from the right-of-way north of Trout Brook, but 10 or so minutes later he said let's go get a load of pine. So before lunch, Fred, Al Michelis and I went up and loaded the pickup truck with pine. There were no signs of new deer, moose or moose trout tracks.
A work of art.
Fred estimates there are about eight loads of pine remaining to be picked up. Fred, Al and I had a good lunch at The Alna Store on the trip back to Sheepscot. After lunch, Fred and I delivered the pine logs to a neighbor at the other end of Cross Road.
The afternoon was spent sorting and stacking 30+ large timbers to be used for the approach spans for Trout Brook. Jason handled the forklift, as Randy Beach (right) directed.
The timbers were put into two piles, sorted primarily by length. Tarps were then put over both piles, as a soaking rain is expected tomorrow. The timbers need to be kept dry for preparation work.
Meanwhile, Zack set a pair of steps in the ground by the driveway outside the first floor northside platform and steps.
Warm day today but not oppressive.