We got to the car park for Threepmuir a bit early, so while I was waiting for the Youth Vision people to arrive I had a look at the walls. There was one place where the copes were starting to come off ...

So I put them back on again.

Stitch in time, and all that ... there are plenty of other bits around the car park needing attention, but the Youth Vision people showed up just as I was getting the last couple of copes above on so they'll need to wait for another day.

​Friday's workshop wasn't so well attended as the previous ones - we only had one workshopee (if that's a word) and three DSWA volunteers; however, four of the Youth Vision people came and helped out too, so we felt we had enough to tackle the next-biggest section of collapsed wall.

When we got the wall stripped down it was obvious what the main problem was - the roots of the nearby trees had moved the foundations of the wall considerably, and most of the base stones were no longer anything like level. We needed a big pinch bar to get the biggest of them out.

Once we'd got it all dug out, and had been reinvigorated by crumpets with Youth Vision's own elder berry jam and Tim's excellent coffee, we started putting the foundations back in.

The bits of wall either side of where we were working were in a pretty bad way - one end in particular was about a foot off the original line (though still staying up due to the masses of mortar that had been put in), so we decided to just build our own section, and tie it in to the existing wall if we had time the next day. By lunchtime (delicious soup, made using coriander which was grown a few yards from where we were eating it) we'd got the first couple of courses up.

And by the end of the day we'd got the throughs on.

The next day my car got a flat tyre (fortunately only a few hundred yards or so from the house, and even more fortunately close to the garage where I go to get my car fixed, though they aren't open on Saturdays). This meant taking public transport to the southern edge of Edinburgh and hiking up to the site, so a one-hour drive became a three-hour bus/walk, and it was lunchtime before we arrived. There were three other DSWA people there though, plus a couple from Youth Vision, and they'd got our bit of wall from the day before up to sub-cope height, and were working on joining it on to the rest of the wall. Sadly, this meant more digging out of root-toppled foundations.

Of course, as is the way of this wall, once we started taking down the bits at the end more came down, which wasn't helped by a yard-long section of copes which were mortared solidly to each other and the stones beneath. Once we'd got this down the gap looked considerably bigger than it had when we'd started, and it was getting obvious that we would have neither enough time nor enough stone to finish the job that day.

We did as much as we could, and Youth Vision will talk to the park rangers to get some more stone delivered, and then we can arrange another visit to get the work finished.

Thanks to everyone who came along to help out and to Youth Vision for their ever-excellent hospitality, and to Sam for photos.

Some of the seat team set to work digging out the loose earth and stones while the rest went in search of large stones to build the base with, and especially flat ones for the seat area.

Meanwhile the cheek-end team went off back past the roundhouse to where the wall had been shortened. Some of the stone had been left beside the wall, though it looked like a lot of it had either been moved along to the roundhouse or used to shore up the path which runs along beside the river at this point.

We found a good big cheek end base stone further up the hill (near where we were working a month ago). It was too heavy to lift but fortunately easy enough to roll it down the hill, and by lunchtime we'd made a decent start (having salvaged some stones from the river which were too good to be used as banking support).

The seat team had just about finished the base, with only the flat stones needing laid on top.

Wooplaw is blessed with a lot of large flat stone - good for both cheek ends and seats - so once we got back to work it didn't take long to complete the cheek end.

Some of the seat team had to leave a bit early, so we joined them and by the end of the day this was complete also.

On Sunday there were only six of us, four from the day before (including three who'd spent the night camping at the site). We decided to make another seat a bit further along from the first one, and to make it a bit different we picked a larger space and decided to dig the seat more in to the bank, and try and make it look like it was emerging from the stones already there.

By lunchtime we'd got the seat area done, and had started on the back, which we were going to build right back in to the bank.

We sat on the first seat to eat our lunch ... useful things, dry stone seats. After lunch we finished off the 'proper' bit of the back, and then piled large stones on the top to join it back into the remains of the old wall at the top of the bank.

We've not got any more visits to Wooplaw planned for this year, but we'll be back in 2027.

Thanks to Derek and Sam for photos.

There were about 20 people there on the Saturday, which was actually a few too many for even a big project like this.

So a small team split off and went to repair a nearby cheek end which needed rebuilding.

And I, who still had my bad back, did my bit and went off to have a look around the castle (well, we all have to help however we can in circumstances like this). It's on an island in the River Dee, and you have to take a boat over to it.

We didn't stay too long though, as we'd been told there was soup, coffee and cake for elevenses. The wallers were getting on well, both at the seat and the cheek end.

Suitable refreshed we (well, they) set back to work, and both sites had progressed by lunchtime.

Linda from the South West branch had not only made the delicious soup and cakes, but also provided wraps for lunch, plus more cake. The weather brightened up a bit in the afternoon, though there were still threatening looking clouds.

By the end of the day the cheek-enders had finished their bit.

The seat wallers had got a lot done as well, but there was still work remaining for the Sunday.

I wasn't able to go back the next day, but hopefully someone will have taken some photos - I'll post them here as soon as I have them.

Thanks to Sam again for some of the photos.

​And here, thanks to Richard, is a photo of the finished wall on the Sunday. They did another cheek end on Sunday as well, but I'm not sure I'll be able to get a photo of that - if I do, I'll add it here.

On Sunday there were only a three of us, and I'd hurt my back the day before so I couldn't do much, but with most of the work already done by lunchtime it was complete.

After lunch we took a tour around the site to look at other places which could do with some work. There are plenty of these at Wooplaw, so we'll be kept busy here for quite a while.

Thanks to Sam for the photos.

Saturday was near-perfect walling weather - sunny but not too hot and with enough of a breeze to keep the insects away. Daan and Kirsty provided us with delicious home made soup and cakes (and their own home-grown apple juice), and sustained by this the trainees made a good job of getting their section up past through height.

However, there were a few issues with the other bit of the wall. The ground level behind it was now quite a bit higher than in front, though it didn't look like that had always been the case, and it looked like the build up of material behind the wall had pushed it forward a bit, causing it to tilt somewhat. We'd had to take our little section almost down to ground level to sort this out and also dismantle quite a bit more at each side.

On Sunday we only had one volunteer to tackle what was now quite a big job, but the trainees got their section finished before the end of the day ...

... so they very kindly came and helped finish off the other bit as well.

Thanks to Daan and Kirsty for hosting a great weekend, and to Sam and Doug for photos.

When we got there last weekend it was dry with some sunshine, and enough of a breeze to keep the midges at bay. The Wooplaw folks had already removed the burnt timbers, and most of the stone was still in place with only one bit of wall badly collapsed. As this was in a better place for the entrance this seemed like a good opportunity to move it.

We found one inhabitant who had decided to stay on despite the fire ...

And also an old Irn Bru bottle embedded in the wall.

It contained some coins and a receipt from the Galashiels Co-op for 20 Embassy cigarettes. Sadly, the water had got in so the date (and the price of 20 fags 30+ years ago) wasn't legible. The coins had been bent to get them into the bottle, so the dates on them weren't readable either.

The stone at Wooplaw is hard greywacke. It tends to be irregular in shape, and it doesn't take well to being hammered - you're more likely to end up with a split right down the middle if you try anything more than minimal shaping. There were some good long pieces, though, which is what you need for cheek ends.

We had a pretty good turnout on the Saturday (nine DSWA members plus a couple of people from Wooplaw), which was too many to work on the roundhouse, but there are lots of walls at Wooplaw so we weren't short of things to do. The woodsmen had found it necessary to knock down a bit of the wall beside the path down to the roundhouse to get their mini tractor in, and they wanted to keep this gap and open up another one opposite to allow for a new circular walk taking in part of the wood which wasn't getting used. They'd marked the route for us in orange paint ...

Sorting this out meant four more cheek ends, so it was good that we had lots of long stone. We had lots of stone generally, in fact, as there was not only the contents of the now demolished sections of wall but there also turned out to be an old stone dump right next to the first cheek end we did (there are several of these dotted about Wooplaw).

There was an ash tree suffering from die-back next to where the last of the cheek ends needed to go which had to come down. It would've been difficult for the tree fellers to work around a newly built wall, and as it was getting late anyway we just cleared away some space around it for them to do their work later that evening.

Meanwhile down at the roundhouse the new doorway was taking shape nicely.

The next day was wetter but still with enough wind to keep the midges away. We were pleased to see that they'd managed to take the tree down without taking any of the wall with it.

I think our cheek ends steadily improved over the weekend, though they all felt pretty solid.

We didn't have so many people on the Sunday (five of the DSWA from the day before plus one new member, plus the two Wooplaw volunteers again) so once we'd done the last of the path cheek ends we all went down to work on the roundhouse. We decided to build a small seat into the inside of the wall where the original entrance had been, so we took down the original cheek ends to allow this to be built properly into the wall.

I didn't have a business card to add to the Irn Bru bottle, but we used a ticket from last week's show (with the show date printed on it) with a note on the back saying "Rebuilt by Wooplaw Community Woodland and East of Scotland DSWA" and the date. The most recent coin we could muster was a 2015 5p piece, so (after a bit of bending) that went in as well.

We built the bottle back into the wall beside the new seat.

We were running a bit sort of stone by the afternoon, so one of the Wooplaw volunteers came with the mini tractor and moved some of the spare stone from the path down for us, and by the end of the day we'd got most of the wall built up.

We'll be back in a couple of weeks to finish off the roundhouse and tackle some of the other projects they have - there's a badger hide which needs some attention, I'm told ...

Thanks to Sam and John for photos, and to Wooplaw for having us, and of course especially to all the volunteers who came along to help out.

They'd set up a couple of tables for us inside the tent as well, where we laid out our books and leaflets and our table-top mini walling set. The wind was blowing directly in through the opening, however, so we had to weigh everything down with hearting (and even so were sent scurrying after things following some particularly strong gusts).

We only really had enough stone to build a couple of meters of wall, and we decided only to take it up to through level for the most part, so we could show people how the wall was put together.

The mini walling kit proved popular again ...

... but not as popular as 'helping' us to build the 'big' wall. We had numerous small helpers, some of whom had remembered us from previous years. It seems we've become something of a show highlight for some budding young wallers, who were very enthusiastic about helping us complete the half-done section - some even willing to forgo watching the BMX stunt bikes in favour of doing some dyking.

I tried to tidy it up as they went along so it didn't present too much of a health hazard ...

As ever we had more people than I could count telling us how much they liked dry stone walls, along with quite a few "it's a dying art" and "how much per meter?" (check for walling bingo). And we must have done a decent job this year as I only had one old farmer asking if I wanted him to show me how it should be done (fair play to him - he'd quite correctly spotted a running joint near the top left). By about 4:30 pm it was quietening down, so we dismantled the wall and put the stone back on the trailer to go back to the farm again, ready for next year.

Thanks to John, James and Sam for coming along to help out, and to Sam for most of the photos, and a massive thank-you to the Haddington Show people for having us once again. 

We had a pretty good turnout - eight members of the branch (including our host, Olly) and one local helper. A lot of the stone was big rounded boulders - I expect the largest of them had been cleared from the field, rather than fallen from the wall.

One thing about large stone is that once the wall starts to go up, it tends to go up pretty quickly. The farm dog helped by inspecting our work, and occasionally testing how comfortable a bed it made.

We were provided by our hosts with delicious soup for lunch, served in their old barn (now a games room for their guests). They have a very impressive old threshing machine.

After lunch we continued with the work on the wall. The rain stayed off for the most part, and the breeze kept the midges at bay.

We must have got about 10 meters of wall repaired, and were ready to put the copes on by the end of the afternoon.

Sunday was a warmer day and less windy than the day before. We had only four of the members from Saturday returning, but another couple joined us, plus a new local community helper and a 'WWOOFer' - a volunteer from Willing Workers On Organic Farms, all the way from Australia. We picked up from where we'd finished the day before, with a couple of the local chickens helping us with the digging out ...

We were again provided with lovely home-made soup for lunch, after which another couple of branch members joined us. Once again the big stone made for quick work once we'd got the collapsed wall dug out.

There was a curved corner to be negotiated, with a metal fence post in the middle of it (Olly is going to keep sheep in the enclosure, and he needs to run a wire fence along the top of the wall to make it secure). The big stone came in handy here, both for forming the corner and for supporting the post (which was almost rusted through at the bottom). 

By mid afternoon we'd got the section we'd started on pretty much completed with just the copes needing put on, so we started tackling the section past the corner as well.

I had to leave at about four o'clock, by which time we'd coped the wall as far as the corner and got the next bit up to about half way. 

A few keener (and in some cases, later-starting) folk stayed on to do a bit more, but I don't have any photos of this. So just imagine the photo above, but with a bit more of the wall done ... 

​Thanks to Oliver and Keesje for looking after us so well, and to Sam for the photos.

And here, at the request of Dr John March, is a photo of me walking along the wall. It was easily solid enough to walk along - the only issue was negotiating the overhanging trees ...

Looks like they made a good job of the wall, too.

It was good to see that the work has progressed on the landscaping - and, of course, that the wall was still up ...