Starting – with high hopes

The Tuesday Group has been kept busy the last quarter with a variety of projects including: - continuing Northiam restoration, Wittersham Rd grand tidy-up plus forays into signage and garden maintenance. ..read on for more details.

Graham reaches the pinnacle of restoration with the addition of the original porch – which hopefully will dissuade water from rotting the entrance area of Northiam staff Cott No:1

Ron looks “keenly” at one of the biggest if hidden projects – re-knitting rear walls with both floor and roof of No 1 cottage – previously “glued” together with layers of lino, mouldering carpet and rotten joists.

Where are we now? “Dad’s Army” scale deception! - transporting the new KE&SR station roadside signs to their correct locations.

Stan with chief sign designer Robin erect the new Northiam station sign.

Fair autumn weather means we can get on with more cottage exterior painting.

Fair-ish weather also means a diversion to Wittersham Rd later in the Autumn for major clearance of platform vegetation. The new grit “surface” is hoisted in to the site.

Arm-aching work barrowing in and then raking the new surface flat prior to compaction. (Lucky we had those chocolate biscuits and plenty of coffee and tea.)

Whilst the vibrator attempts to consolidate the surface in the distance, the “donkeys’ cart in the raw materials..

The “Himalaya stomp” – the Michael Palin method of compacting loose surfaces as seen in a (then) recently broadcast TV programme.

Once the whole area had been neatened up ready for Santa and his pixies the following month, somebody mentioned the Witter-sham platform white line. Here we are re-discovering it before repainting it but interrupted yet again by tamper-training.

With ladders everywhere Humph gets to grips with tar-paint - the first coat of roof paint having proved a failure. Bravely beneath the tar-brush, puts up the rambling rose supports round the entrance.

A rotten job - literally! The Northiam station floor has succumbed to the ingress of water and must be replaced before the next operating season.

No sooner discovered, than demolition starts. Energetic lot the Tues group!!

More serenely Ray solitarily soldiers on smothering No:2 cottage in a good coat of paint to hold it together a little longer!

That’s more like it! The December sun has generally deserted us but both cottages are coming on nicely now with roofs being tarred and cream paint taking over from the undercoat.
Like to join a good team to help to get even more jobs finished well - tea and coffee thrown in? If so contact Graham Hopker

Contact Graham Hopker (Evenings) on 01303 862811

Photographs taken by John Rose