Team Doris Turtle Power

Todays quality posting isn't strictly a crafty/makey/doey subject and therefore not particularly relevant to the general guff Clever Doris likes to harp on about, but one nonetheless I think may be of interest in the spirit of adventure, wonderment and getting stuff for free.
Whilst on a recent Team Doris Seaside Expedition to Runswick Bay on the Yorkshire Coast the Young Clevers, being at one with nature and all, happened upon the amazing sight of a fossilised turtle 1/2 mile down the beach. It was just sat there - all undiscovered and turtley-looking. Epic dialogue ensued:

Clever Norris: Mum look what I found
Clever Maurice: No I found it
CN: No I found it
CD: What is it?
CN: It's a tortoise
CD: 'Tisnt
CN: 'Tis too
CD: No way
CM: ...Way

We couldn't possibly leave it there for another grillion years. It needed to come back with us to its spiritual home of Leeds.
Moving it should be an easy enough task: we had a blue Ikea bag*. We were sorted.
All we needed now was a piece of rope, and I challenge anyone not to be able to find any rope on a beach. You can ALWAYS find rope on a beach. And find it we did, wedged between 2 giant rocks.
Now Mr Doris is a bit of a whizz with knots (well he has been on a Ray Mears Bushcraft course you know; a birthday present from CD, to which he responded more emotionally than the birth of his own children: what a Guy). Anyway armed with rope and Ikea bag we set about the task of transporting it from its zillion year old resting place. Bear in mind that it must've weighed about 75 kilos which is, according to Mr D, 3 times the manual handling limit recommended by H&S legislation (how we while away the evenings).
Basically it was bloody impossible to lift, even by the most hale and hearty of fillies or indeed the most manly of men (and that includes Manly Mick Mcmanly from Manchester).
However, beaten we would not be. This geological phenomenon was coming to Leeds on a tartan picnic blanket in the back of a mazda estate.

So with a bit of nifty wrapping and Ray Mears type knotting we embarked upon the task of transporting it along the beach and back to base. Easy in theory. Not in practice I hasten to add. The tide had just gone out, rendering the shore line very claggy/clay-ey and exceedingly pebbly. Over rocks and clay we proceeded in an Enormous Turnip story kind of way. CD pulling in a tug of war manner, Mr D  pushing, CN kicking rocks out of the way and CM texting his mates. Rugged stalwarts that we are, even us Clevers nearly threw the towel in. However ultimately we were not going to be beaten by this mere pebble so we continued on towards the slipway (we hadn't even thought through how the blazes we'd actually get Myrtle the turtle into the boot). 3 hours later we made it and with a bit of the old core strength and heave ho-ness we managed to hump it onto the blanket and swing it into the car.

Only in England would you find on a soggy beach on a soggy february 2 saxon peasants walking in 1 direction and a mad family dragging a stone in an Ikea bag the other way. And without either party batting an eyelid at each other. Although when asked by one other bloke what we had in the bag, Mr D replied "oh this, its only the mother in law" (other crap northern jokes are available) before continuing on our way...

2 days later we returned home to Leeds where Myrtle now happily resides on a tarmaced driveway. Research ensued whereby we disappointingly discovered, via the medium of the tinterweb, that Myrtle is not actually a fossilised turtle but a geological phenomonen known  as a Septarian Nodule and is formed from lumps of mudstone and limestone that have dried out, forming shrinkage cracks. Had we known that from the outset we may not have gone to all the effort. So I'm kind of glad we didn't know because we've convinced many a visitor passing through that it's actually a real fossilised turtle.

Sadly the Ikea bag was harmed during the completion of this mission...

Young Clever Norris, thinking Myrtle looked a bit incomplete, made it his personal mission on a subsequent seaside trip to find a stone shaped like a head...

 

Anyway we're sticking with the story of it being a fossilised turtle, which we intend to dine out on for years, adding to our list of 'remember whens'.
As evident in CD's previous posts: 'never let the truth get in the way of a good story'.



*Hey all you Ikea Marketers: how about an ad campaign themed on the subject of innovative uses for a blue Ikea bag? (other than carrying beach paraphernalia, laundry or the daily transporting of  wine bottles to the recycling plant). 
You can have that one on me - Clever Doris.
Just pay me in hot dogs.