THE White Horse at Cherhill will be noticeably brighter to passers-by this week after its biennial re-chalking by local volunteers and Cherhill Scouts.

The famous monument is one of the oldest of its kind in the country and is re-chalked every two years to make sure it is visible to the surrounding area.

Community members and the 1st Cherhill Scout Group had previously spent two evenings in the granary at Upper Farm in Cherhill to bag 14 tons of chalk.

The chalk was transported by tractor to the horse where around 40 volunteers were clearing the monument of weeds and tidying the outline.

The chalk took two and a half hours to spread.

Group Scout leader Andy Stagg said: “The atmosphere was of a community coming together and working very well and hard to achieve a fantastic result.

“I would like to thank all involved as this isn’t an easy task to carry out and at just before 1pm we all wondered down the hill to take in our hard work and the end result.”

The 1st Cherhill Scout Group, which celebrates its 50th birthday in June, gets involved with the chalking every two years and even took the opportunity to invest two Beavers into Cherhill Scout group.

David Grafton, chairman of Cherhill Parish Council, said: “We had a really good load of young Beavers and Scouts doing the bagging at the farm which really helped.”