Loading Day this year was very different. The four inches of snow that fell on Friday night made getting to the site more difficult. Many did not turn up and others were snowed in. People did arrive from Manchester, Bristol, Winchester, Mansfield, Sheffield and Louborough. Crich was nearer in miles but the altitude gave Bob a two hour dig out of his car.

The first task was to shovel the snow off the yard so that we could walk and safely move the pallets of goods. That done, we started to sort out the containers, which had been loaded the previous afternoon in a blizzard. We only have a fork lift on the Friday. Next door to the unit loaded the lighter pallets and Brakes ran rescue and loaded the pallets weighing a ton with their more powerful forklifts. Without all their help we would have been in big trouble. Thank You

This year we had the use of the unit next door where we placed our cupboards, tables and chairs onto pallets. This meant we did not need so many people to unload which was great as we were a third down in numbers due to the weather.

Instead of bringing all our supplies onto the yard we only brought the pallets out as the containers needed them to load. This was more difficult for the loading teams in the containers but it helped to keep the containers drier. They will be sealed for about six weeks and the boxes will release their moisture into the containers. The moisture collects on the roof and then it rains as it has created it own echo rain system. This is not good for all the packed items especially the dried food.

Thank you for your prayers. Everyone arrived and returned home in safety and there were no accidents on site. They packed a very large amount of items this year. It was the first year we were able to view all that we had to send and we were overwhelmed by the quantity and we doubted that we would get it all in the containers. We had 970 chairs and 160 tables as well as cupboards etc etc.

The south containers were accused of having a door in the back of the container and were loaded things into the Salvation Army container parked behind.

They packed 8928 items during the day. We closed the last container after 7pm and then we prayed protection on the containers. The containers have now left for the docks. They will sail on the 30th March and are expected at the docks in Honduras on 4th May. Then start the fun and games of import.

We thought Saturday’s weather was bad until we felt the strength of the wind on Sunday, with a wind chill of about -5c, and then realised how good the weather had been on the Saturday. It snowed all day Saturday but did not start to freeze until later in the afternoon. The wind was less than predicted.

A big thank you to all who made the day work you did a fantastic job for the children in Honduras, on their behalf lots of hugs. (This is how they end their letters.)