The cap has been made seperatly

The edge of the lid is scratched and dampened to help it stick

A tense moment as the cap goes on - will it fit! It is then smoothed down as good as we can so that the oven is now a hollow pyramid.

Simon sets about cutting the door out with a hacksaw

And here it is, the inside shell of the oven. It will be left for a wee while now to dry out, and to see if it collapses :-)

While it didn't collapse, some quite big cracks appeared.

Rachel and Rosalie fill the cracks, and add another layer of clay about 1cm thick. We tried breaking up the pumice and pushing it in, but it fell off.

Keeping the pumice whole and pressing them into the clay, like cobbles, worked a lot better, and was quicker.

We mixed clay with straw, cabbage tree leaves, sand, pumice dust and anything else laying about to make a fiberous clay, about the consistency of a fresh cow pat.