Upper Wharfedale Volunteers, North Yorkshire
Keith Budd, Volunteer
When the clouds are down and the snow is horizontal, it's miserable until you
get started. Then your fingers stop feeling like a bunch of carrots. You begin
to enjoy the work and each others' company. And at the end of the day you look
at what you've built and feel satisfied.
We came together in 1999 from very different backgrounds - hospital consultancy,
adult education, marketing, mental health, finance, teaching. We just gelled,
and have met every Wednesday since.
Drystone walls have been here since the 11th century. You can't think of the
Dales without them. And since foot and mouth, they're coming back into their
own as small herds of hardy cattle replace some of the huge flocks of sheep.
It's hard work: you're moving two or three tons of stone each, usually uphill.
And the weather can be terrible. Sometimes we call it a day: shifting big stones
on steep, wet ground can be dangerous.
We don't just build walls. We've used our professional backgrounds to organise
publicity for the Trust's work here. We appear on television and in the press.
They call us The Magnificent Seven -it makes us cringe!
We raised more than £18,000 to build Buckden Garth, an interpretation
centre in the village where school trips can meet, out of the pouring rain.
We handed it over to the Trust last year with a celebrity grand opening.
My proudest moment was when we took the former out from under the first drystone
bridge to be built for at least 100 years. It didn't move an inch. Peter Katic,
our warden, was so delighted he leaped on top and danced on it.
Advice to volunteers? Be ready to give and take: with us, no-one's the boss.
And if you see something worth doing, don't let people put you off. Just do
it!
