OK I admit, it's very hard to make a dig diary sound interesting when all you've done all day is shift stone off the site. I tried naming some of the stones but it didn't make it sound more exciting so gave up. Mind you the team have worked like heroes, especially when you consider that for our field school students from Bradford and CUNY this is their first excavation. We keep telling them that it will be worth it, there's a chambered tomb under that lot but not sure they're convinced!
They're certainly not downhearted though - this morning they were singing while they worked - and no, not Hi-ho, hi-ho etc, but the full version of Bohemian Rhapsody complete with all the words & Brian May's big guitar solo - air guitar naturally. Didn't get a photo of this as I was doing a very creditable (even if I say so myself) Brian May impression with a shovel at the time, so here's a shot of a couple of the students and the very large dent they've made in the backfill we put against the tomb wall (to their right) last year - that area full to the top before they got started:
We also had a fair few visitors to site today too, who'd followed our signs down from Midhowe tomb and trekked along the shore to us, which we really appreciated, it's nice to see visitors and they were all pretty staggered to see the amount of stone we'd shifted plus the amount still to go.
I must admit I'd forgotten quite how tiring opening up a site is - we used to think deturfing was hard enough work, but I think Swandro must definitely go down as the hardest site ever to open and close. All that heavy work plays havoc with your hands, lucky I only need 2 fingers to type with as none of the others are working!
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