The birthday boy's special outing

If you have the choice of anywhere for an afternoon outing on your birthday where would it be. I bet you said 'the allotment'. Well Nick did. Here he is with his gate. The fencing is now complete so next time digging can start. How exciting is that!

A bit claggy

Day off again, the sun was shining so no alternative but to fill the flask and off to the allotment. Digging was out of the question thought as the only outcome was big shoes. Planted two blackcurrent bushes though so the fruit plot now has three rhubarb, two blackcurrent, and a pear tree (sadly no partridge).

The inspector calls

Oh what a lovely gate!

We are allotmenteers and train spotters

Never a dull moment on the allotment. Shortly after a class 450/1 Four-Coach ‘Desiro’ and an EWS cargo train with 14 carriages passed by, steam came to Basingstoke. Great excitment from Plot 51 and 52 as this magnificent beast passed by.

Not sure what it was or where it was going but it was very exciting.

Updated 11pm - It was the Battle of Britain Class 34067 'Tangmere' with pullman cars. Click here to find out more although this doesn't explain why it was in Basingstoke on 18 February. Curiouser and curiouser.

What more could a man want

A cup of coffee and a sledge hammer makes Nick a happy man.

The rabbit defences are almost complete and we will even keep out the ones that can pole vault as fences are 5 ft high!

Rain stops play

How dare it rain on a Sunday. As digging was out of the questions what were we to do - housework, studying - WRONG, we went to Homebase. A good job that we did too. We have been thinking about a little portable greenhouse for the allotment and they had the 'Versatile Greenhouse' reduced from £49.99 to £20, bargain. Weather permitting we will be levelling and laying a base next weekend to get in situ. This means that, not only can we extend the growing season but we can also extend the crop range, so we have now added cucumbers to the list of crops and bought a pack of 'Telegraph' cucumber seeds.

Pesky wabbits

Cute, I don't think so! The plot at the top is covered in holes and there is a nice trail of droppings on the path. The mission has started to make the allotment rabbit proof. We have scavenged enough chicken wire to fence off the whole of Basingstoke and work has started on patching and fixing the fences to keep them out. If this doesn't work we may be looking to borrow a Jack Russell or install a plastic owl as a deterrent!

Our first visitor

We were able to get a couple of hours in today as we were not at work and we had our first official visitor (spot the British Gas van in the background). She is quoted as saying 'it is a lot bigger than it looks in the pictures' which is quite true.

A bit of plastic and a lot of string

After two 6 hours days it is starting to look less daunting. A lot of edging, spreading of recycled plastic, raking and laying of string and it looks like it is shaping up nicely.

A hugh bottle of Radox now needed.

Why we chose this allotment

29 January, we chose our allotment, but why this one? There were others but this one felt right. A lot bigger than intended and a lot more weeds and work but it just felt like it was the one.