It is now OFFICIAL  "Bob has got a BIG ONE" 

After months of searching a suitable 13 ton JCB excavator was recently found in the Greater Manchester area.  It has been hard with diggers getting sold from under my feet before I even had a chance to look at them.  Anyway we now have one which arrived on 5th March.  An interesting delivery as by the time the low loader transport arrived at Goyt Bridge it was already dark so tracking along to the mill to park it up was difficult trying to avoid overhanging branches and squeezing in through the 5 bar gate onto the site.  It was all completed by 8pm and we went home to ready ourselves for Friday's excitement - our cabins were going to arrive.  Rachel and I were down on site to finally prepare the ground for the arrival of our welfare cabin and a storage container for the hand tools.  About 11am we were ready to lift the welfare cabin, off the back of a trailer, using the digger as a crane.  It slotted beautifully into place.  It was then off back across the river with the digger and trailer to pick up the second cabin/container.  This is on loan, at no charge, for the duration of the project to act as storage for our hand tools Thanks must got to Kevin Swindells for his support in lending this container to us. Today (Saturday 7th March) we have been busy moving our hand tools from their temporary coal cellar location into their new home. Once that was completed it was back to the dig and the never ending clearing of spoil heaps - I think they grow on their own!