Linda McElhenny reports:
On a beautiful sunny, but cool, Saturday morning we all met at Gaffneys Bakery in Heathcote for coffee before setting off at 9.30am for the Redcastle Cemetery.
Although, some were torn between manual labour and the Heathcote Market, which looked to be of a considerable size, complete with local produce, craft items, etc.
The area had had a fair amount of recent rain and on a track not far from the cemetery gates, in true 4×4 fashion we had to traverse water. (Well, maybe a big long stretch of puddles). It was enough though, to put a nice grey slick on the 4by.
With great enthusiasm, we got out our various pieces of equipment – chain saws, whipper snippers, rakes, weed sprayers, etc. There were saplings to be cut down, weeds to be snipped from around
the graves, fallen trees to be cut up and lots of fetching and carry- ing of debris to either the fire, or the green waste pile.
Glenda’s sharp eye and spotted some small agave cactus, which would have filled a bucket. This find piqued interest in others who also found more cactus.
They were so small they were hard to spot. All our years of tending the cemetery have paid off with such a small regrowth of the agave. Graeme recalled in the early years, the cemetery was quite overrun with it.
With everyone working diligently, we had most of the work done before lunch. A great bonfire, lit to get rid of the dried wood, pro- vided us with some lovely coals for our sausage sizzle.
Graeme and Gayle prepared and cooked the sausages and supplied salad, cheese bread and rolls. A pumpkin and sultana cake and chocolate biscuits followed. Yummy!
After a final look around and a clean up of the last of the debris, it was time to head home. We left after a great day, tired but happy with what we had achieved.
