They used to quarry Mendip stone at Windsor Hill, north-west of Shepton Mallet, but when the work stopped, the quarry reverted to the wild, and the random growth of trees and scrub created an enclosed and secluded woodland and home for wildlife. There are few signs of the quarry's former industrial purpose, except where the rock in surrounding walls is exposed and scarred. I reached the wood by winding, sometimes bumpy ways and came to what had been the quarry-master's house, a long and roomy building beside a grass clearing. Surrounding the clearing were an open workshop equipped for carpentry, a small but solid building which had been the explosives' chamber, various tents rescued from the aftermath of the Glastonbury festival, and a smart-looking shepherd's hut. I was welcomed into the house where the couple (the owners) were having a mid-morning break – coffee and home-baked doughnuts – with four other guests.
Some people come here for a day at a time to volunteer to help make the quarry productive, to work as carpenters or cooks, clear shrub or tackle whatever needed doing. Others come for longer to join the household, maybe tending livestock, fencing or carving spoons, so as to benefit from living and working away from their habitual environment. Nature, though, is not more consistently benign here than elsewhere; Japanese knotweed rampages over native growth, and deer ruin precious, newly planted saplings, part of a woodland development plan agreed with the Forestry Commission.
The livestock comprises one saddleback sow with seven piglets, 15 chickens and some bees. There is progress (despite the deer) in tree-planting, and hope of future commercial coppicing. There is a plan, too, to open a Saturday forest school. One of the party took me to see Harriet, the sow, and her young. As we watched them wallowing and rooting for food, he explained that, having delivered them at birth and tended them through life, he must be the one to take them to the abattoir.
After coffee, the first task was hanging heavy gates in new, spacious pig-runs. It demanded strength, good humour, and skills developed, sometimes painfully, through concentrated, co-operative effort. We met again at the house at 1pm for soup from an enormous tureen and home-baked bread. It was starting to rain when the working party went out again as I headed back to the world outside the quarry.