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Anyone who followed the saga of my garden being demolished by a landslide, will recall the Washingtonia that took a blow. Topic link Our neighbour has worked fast, and the new boulder wall is finished. He was intending to help me right the Washie tomorrow with a digger and rope from up on his terrace, but I was worried that the angle of the "pull" would be too steep and lift it out of the ground. So this evening (sorry for the dark photos) I tried something a little more genteel. All you need is a bottle jack, some half-bricks for shims and two poles, or lengths of wood; one to act as the ram, and the other as a prop. Simple, but effective. I also scooped away the soil from around the base of the trunk on the far side, and kept it filled with water. A few more degrees and I'll pull it into position from the other side with a rope and some weights. When it's upright, I'll prop it with some lengths of timber.

That is really warm water, Zig. This past week was very windy & cooled the local beach water temps to near 60F or lower for a while. I remember running down the beach to the water in Darwin, and if you were barefoot, your soles were cooked by the time you got to the water as the sand was so hot at low tide. Then when you got to the shallows, you realised that the water wasn't much cooler! I always used to wear thongs/flipflops etc to avoid the burn! Daryl