i showed up to the ropes course this morning at 8am because that was where i was scheduled to start for the day. nobody showed up, so i called my supervisor to see what was going on... turns out, i was being put on another project. i was going to be working with a small group lead by tom lahey (this guy is huge here... the ropes guru, apparently). this group was going to be building up a low ropes course from the ground up... actually, for most of today, we started below ground. now, by ropes course, i mean something huge... tall wooden poles, thick cables, and the whole shabang. in short, today required us to be drilling, hammering, cutting, digging, measuring, lifting, shoveling, and tamping. this last thing called tamping is something i'll explain in a second. but yes, this is a huge deal, and its going to be a sweet course that'll be here for at least the next 30 years.
so today was day one of construction. when we arrived, we had nothing but the raw materials... nothing was dug out, nothing was already assembled... we even had to load up a couple or rolls of cable that weighed 300 pounds each... definitely required a team effort for that. once the plan was set, we were split up into two crews for a while, and i was crew manager of one of the groups (i'm not gonna lie, i was pretty stoked about that).
one of the things i also got to do was oversee the digging done by this sweet machine. this machine and i were good buds by the end of our time together... i directed and measured 19 holes to be dug... varying from 4 feet to 7 feet deep. so this guy working the machine would dig, i'd measure, and then depending on the measurement, the guy would either dig more or move on. i was pretty impressed with this guy's skills on this machine... crazy accurate.
after all the holes were dug, we had to put the appropriate wooden poles in each one. first came eight 12-foot poles, over a foot in diameter. once we got the pole in the hole, we had to put the dirt (which is actually super tough clay) and dry cement into the hole, while tamping at the same time. again, i'll come back to tamping in a second. so the smaller poles weren't so bad... the holes were about 4 feet deep 7 feet long, and 2 fee wide.
it was when the 40-foot poles were put in that the holes seemed endless.
for the 40 foot poles, this crane came in to lift the poles and hold them vertical so that we could put them in their proper place. how much does a 40-foot wooden pole weigh? over 1000 pounds... yes, one thousand. so these poles were put in holes that were 7 feet deep, 7 feet long, and 2 feet wide... 98 cubic feet... that's massive. so once the poles were in place, we'd begin that filling process i just explained.
now for the tamping. tamping is the method of packing in the dirt/clay and dry cement back in the hole, layer by layer. doesn't sound too bad? well, our tools for tamping were these metal poles with a little ball at one end (smaller than a tennis ball)--the poles were about 8 feet long, and weighed about 30 pounds (you can see people holding these long skinny poles in the second picture... those were our tamping tools). i guess you won't be able to appreciate how difficult tamping is until you've given it a shot for yourself... i'll try to give you an analogy as to what tamping is like.
imagine having a cup of flour. however, you filled that cup up with a layer of flour at a time... and each layer, you used a sewing needle to pack it down. now, turn that cup into a huge hole in the ground, turn the flour into clay and cement, and make that needle about 8 feet longer and 30 pounds heavier... same concept. and let me tell you--the most exhausting thing ever. i mean, tamping in almost 100 cubic feet of clay and dry cement? multiple times (12 times today)?! i am pretty sure my arms are just about useless right now. actually, my entire body aches already... i don't think i've ever worked this hard...i mean, this is hard core construction stuff. you should have seen me... dirt all over my face, dirt and dry cement all over my clothes, sweet construction gloves, sunglasses... i looked pretty dang hard core when the day was done... i wish i had a picture of that.
it's surprisingly rewarding though. time flies, and the whole time you are just using so much of yourself to put this stuff together... and in a few days, it's going to be done, and there will be this sweet ropes course that you helped build. it's a highly fulfilling project, and totally worth all the work and energy needed. i've got two or three more days, and then this project should be done. i'll keep adding pictures so you can see the progress.
i'm tired... time for me to go.
wait, one last sentence...
i led an open archery session, and only one kid showed up... and it was a kid, about 15 years old, wearing a cape.
end of story.
1 comment:
hahaha wearing a cape... hahahaha that's cool, and a little scary if that kid is running around with accurate archery skills (which he has if you taught him).
The work sounds really hard, but rewarding. I can't wait to see the finished project.
Post a Comment