Railway garden

The weather, back on 22nd May, was overcast but dry so off we went to train(ing).  The plan for me was to strip the centre bed of all the bulbs and re-arrange tthe perennial flowers ready to plant up the summer bedding.  

During the course of the day I was involved in little train trips so the camera was brought out.  This is the view that Visitors get when they first see 'my' garden ....... impressive ain't it?!!

 Behind the walls are all the flower beds and then down the side of the 'Bothy' is the signal box garden.  I am gradually changing the planting so that Cottage Garden plants, in character with the Steam Train Era, will be growing in all of these beds.  They should need little attention but be attractive all year round so that the garden will be well used.  Here is the centre bed with all the bulbs 'going over'.  I spent most of the day on here, pulling, digging, chatting - guys come for a smoke and chat while they're puffing!

 So now the bed is ready for me to come back tomorrow and I am completely kn******d as the sun has been shining for several hours and now I have finished I retire to the 'Support Coach which has shade, seating and .... more importantly ........ a cup of coffee.

While I am seated enjoying my coffee, I am told to stay there as the engine needs to be shunted onto another line.

Free ride!!!

I'm staying put!

So now you get a short tour of the engine locomotive works. 

This is  my the garden seen from the shunting tracks, the centre bed starts just past the fence.  These firs are the same size as the ones that were originally growing in the centre bed so there has been a massive change.

On the other side of the tracks is the office, just an old railway building that houses the main

admin office and the 'Boss' office inside.

This is the view as we travelled down the line, from the office past the engines locomotives being repaired, refurbished or just rusting going to be used for spares!

  

  and then comes the workshed.  Most of the cleaning, welding, painting and repairs is carried on inside.  Most of the 'Tuesday' volunteers are working away inside.  There is an overhead gantry which is cleared and used by visitors on Open Day so that the current work can be seen. 
We were shunted more or less back into position and then PJ and I packed the car and came home just to start again the next day.

Fortunately for us the next day was fine again and PJ was coming into the yard to help get 'Lizzy' ready for her weekend trip.  She would be going down to Llandudno.  Various trips across the country are made during the year by various engines to help out with the finances.  She is going down to London for the Jubilee celebrations and PJ is getting very excited, he wont see much as he will be in the support coach but at least he will be there.  There was a delivery of coal ready for the trip and that was a new experience for us both ......... the coal comes in on a truck and is then loaded into the tender.  You can see the crane emptying the coal, which meant that quite a bit of coal fell on the floor - and what about the paint!!!  There was quite a large pile of coal scattered about so another had to shovel up into buckets and pass up to PJ so he could throw it all into the tender. Nothing was wasted ....... all costs money you know!!!!!

 BTW:  the blue car is our newest aquisition so here are two of PJ loves!!

During this time I continued to plant up the centre bed.  The plan is that there will be two Union flags surrounded by red, white and blue plants.  This is one of the flags!!

Hopefully this will be in full flower by Open Day, one of the fir trees is also planted out with red, white and blue and the hanging basket by the signal box ............ please cross everything that we get some dry weather to help these poor little things.  I have been growing them on since March when they were only a few leaves big.  I am worried about the colours as I have lost my ability to concentrate for long and several times caught myself planting white instead of blue.  Could be quite an interesting version of the flag!!!

If they do manage to flower for the 23rd I shall come in the day before and hopefully trim them into the correct colours and shape.  I may put a sign up saying something along the lines of the fact that I am a volunteer and have never attempted anything like this in my life.  We shall see..............