Irmah 
Web content producer
Here are some photos of the team who worked on Trench 5 under Ivana Vetta’s supervision for the first three weeks of the 2014 excavations.
The 2013 site plan, showing the 2013 trench locations, is at the bottom of this post. Trench 5 was described on this blog last year as Excavation Area 1.
Web content producer
Here are some photos of the team who worked on Trench 4 under Kristen Mann’s supervision for the first three weeks of the 2014 excavations.
The 2013 site plan showing the 2013 trench locations is at the bottom of this post. This trench is trench number 4, described last year on this blog as Excavation Area 4.
Web content producer
Here are some photos of the team who worked under Hugh Thomas’ supervision for the first three weeks of the 2014 excavations.
The 2013 site plan, showing trench locations of the 2013 excavations is at the bottom of this post. The trench supervised by Hugh is in the vicinity of what was described last year on this blog as Excavation Area 3, which was supervised by Hugh Thomas last year.
by Paul Donnelly
Archaeologist, and Decorative Arts Curator, Powerhouse Museum
Furniture numbers among the items I help to look after in my role as curator at the Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences (Powerhouse Museum) in Sydney, and inevitably my eye was drawn to the characterful wooden chairs on Andros.
The Café Kantouni where the team are staying beckons passers-by with its attractive outside dining space, typical of a Greek island pensione.
It is an extensive space with simple but well-made furniture under large shady trees supported on white-painted trunks and white-washed textured walls that morph into inbuilt benches upon which sit geraniums, thriving (seemingly against the odds) in tight terracotta pots or olive oil can containers. And joining it all together is slate paving outlined in white.
Web content producer
Here are some photos of the team who worked on Antonio Bianco’s excavation area for the first three weeks of the 2014 excavations. I took the first two photos when I visited the site for the first time on Friday 10 October. However, Laura Patterson was working at the Andros Archaeological Museum washing finds on that day, so she isn’t in my photos. Callum Ferrell noticed this and so Antonio Bianco gave me some photographs he had from earlier in the season which include Laura – which I have added, below. Thanks, Callum and Antonio.
The 2013 site plan, showing trench locations of 2013 excavations is at the bottom of this post. The trench Antonio is supervising is in the vicinity of trench number 4 (described on this blog last year as Excavation Area 4).
Web content producer
The Zagora Archaeology Project (ZAP) excavation season duration is six weeks. Volunteers generally sign up for either the first three weeks or the second three weeks or for the entire season. Work takes place on site six days a week, Mondays to Saturdays, except for the middle weekend, this year, 11 and 12 October, when there is no work on site on the Saturday, giving people a clear weekend to rest, relax and recuperate.
Most of the participants who signed up for only the first three weeks were packed up, ready for departure, on the morning of Friday 10 October. They would have returned from a day’s work at Zagora, had a quick shower at Batsi, and then headed to Gavrio for a ferry, mostly to Athens, and then home.
by Irma Havlicek
Web content producer
In 2012, the first year of the project, several ZAP members met at Rafina and we chose this Rafina cafe for our refreshments before catching the ferry to Andros. The service was friendly and the food fresh and tasty. So last year, in 2013, Paul and I sought to repeat the experience – which was just as good the second time.
Web content producer
At the end of every day of excavation at Zagora, whatever artefacts are found (mostly sherds remaining from pottery objects which have broken under roof and wall collapses) are taken to the Archaeological Museum in Chora. There, they are safely stored until they can be cleaned, assessed, sorted, catalogued and, in some cases, repaired.
It’s an important, time-consuming and painstaking job requiring several people’s work every day.
Archaeologist
Much of the work in the early days of the excavation season requires measurements relying on survey data from previous years to ascertain where to excavate.
The next phase is to remove the schist slabs placed over last year’s excavations to protect the surface, and then to remove the backfill which had been placed into the trench to protect it.
Here are some photographs of the work taking place in Excavation Area 1 which is being supervised this year, as last year, by Ivana Vetta.
Archaeologist
[Note from Irma Havlicek, web producer: Here is a post Hannah prepared last week, in the first week of the Zagora excavation season. Apologies for not having published it then – but the blogging has to take a lower priority than the planning, excavations and research during this last year of the currently-funded three-year Zagora Archaeological Project. Processing the posts can take time to write, review, check and publish – grabbing moments to do that work in between the essential archaeology work. This post of Hannah’s provides a lovely glimpse of the first day of excavations. I hope you’ll agree: better late than never.]
There is a definite type of excitement associated with the first day on site. It is both a keen eagerness and anticipation for the day ahead, whilst also that slightly deathly feeling of waking up in what seems to be the middle of the night, when the thought of trekking to a dusty exposed promontory to dig a hole seems an absurd idea!