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Record Breaking Crate Retieval, Nh Officially Becomes 2nd Driver

Saturday 13 November 2010 - -

Benniboy's car was at the garage in Berkhampstead and wouldn't be ready till Tuesday. All the tools, flags, harness were in the boot. So we had to decide if we were going to cancel getting the crates from Martin's and wait till Tuesday. We were able get the 2 tools needed, Benniboy got a rubber mallet and Nh got his Dad's luxury claw. The crate retrieval was still on.

Benniboy got dropped off and Nh's at 11am. We got in the Fiesta and deployed to Martin's. There was annoying traffic, due to roadworks. We went left at the first turning in to the estate. We easily found Hill Croft and parked in the usual place. While parking we saw Martin and we both waved.

We went to the pallets and got one off the top. It was perfect for dismantling, as it only had planks on one side. We clawed the top and bottom planks and then hammered the thick planks off, then twisted the rest. All the crates were like this, so we had dismantled 5/6 in under 15 minutes. One crate was finished in about a minute - must be a record.



We then hammered the nails in. Nh took the finished planks to the Fiesta. He had placed some bags on the seats. We completed hammering in all the protruding nails and the backseats were stack up to the windows. as there were so many planks, 5 crates worth, we had to hold them in some how. We came up with the idea of using the seat belts. We put both across and tied them in the middle, this worlked perfectly.




We knocked on the door to say goodbye, but no one answered. We drove to Homebase, the planks staying nicely in place. We found some string and 65mm nails. They were a rip off at £2.99 for only 250g, compared to £1.30 for 500g at Toolstation. The nails were galvanised though, so should be a bit better quality. We had a quick look at the tools and door handles.


We then went to Mcdonalds. We both got a takeout and Benniboy gave his free cheeseburger to Nh. Benniboy had a chicken sandwich and Nh got nuggets. They were doing work in the drive thru, there was a crate. We finished eating and saw a new red bin, on the lamp post. We had to complete the challenge in the Fiesta and couldn't succumb to simple gettting out of the car and putting the rubbish in the bin.


We deployed to the wilder. Benniboy was getting quite used to Nh's driving now. We parked in a nice spot, near an entrance. We carried batched of planks in to the wilder, with the odd car going past. Benniboy had to rip the string with his hands. We tied up the planks in 2 batches and the structure planks in one heavy batch.


We each took one of the plank batches. We ascended them up the treehouse, then went back to get the structure planks, we used the crate carrying technique. Nh ascended and started destroying the bad north wall. Benniboy took 2 structure planks up at a time. He then took some of Nh's debris to the little fort.

Benniboy went to the toilet and saw that there was a muggle family at the treeswings. Benniboy joined Nh. We put a load of planks on level 2, we have a lot now.

The north wall was quite bare and dangerous now. The muggle family was on the golf path. The father was taking pictures of the treehouse. He was there for a while and kept on taking pictures. He could have just been admiring the treehouse. But, as it looked like we were destroying it, maybe he was reporting us, or just reporting us because we were building a treehouse. Maybe because of the noise pollution.


We used the longer planks to start rebuilding the north wall. They fitted well and we made sure the first one was level. We then continued to professionally and efficiently add planks.


We hammered one nail in each end and made them neatly line up. We put up 24 planks in total. This means there were 50 nails in a pack, as we dropped one and used an extra one on the last plank. 6 pence per nail compared to 1.3 pence per nail at toolstation.


We had the wall up to head height now. Just a little gap on the right. We put all the remaining planks on level 2. We descended.





There was a lot of rubbish timber at the treehouse base. We wrapped them up in flags and deposited some at the little fort. Then decided to take the rest the triangle in the deep. Benniboy placed a stick in the flag to make it easy to carry.




We arrived at the triangle area, the Ali G writing was still there, along with the pink tree. We deposited the planks and stuffed the flag in a hole. We then exited the wilder. Nh drove Benniboy back to Hemel, we passed many geocache areas.

We stopped off at Toolstation and got 2 packs of 65's. Benniboy showed Nh how to get back to the freeway. Nh dropped Benniboy off, then deployed home.

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