Okay there’s so much fabulous stuff going on! firstly….  *drumroll*… Pete and co and have only gone and done it and the Tower of Power and the solar pump WORKS!  It wasn’t easy but water from our 750l tank has been pumping up the hill to the 6000l tank at the top and our tank replenished by ground water. This sunny weekend the mains water was turned off  and the plot holders have been watering with our water!  Hat’s off to Pete Clee for his maverick vision and hard work. There’s still a few glitches to be worked out but the Lord Mayor Faruk Choudhary and Steve Clampin (Bristol City Council Allotments Manager) came to the Get Growing Trail on Saturday and were very impressed.  I’ll put a page up on the website with more details of the system soon.

    

And on Saturday the sun shone and we were open for volunteer and visitors on the Get Growing Trail and we raised over £100 selling cakes and plants!  This seemed like a tidy sum until I got home and checked my email to find out it looks like we weresuccessful in our funding bid to get money to build a proper shelter.  WHOOOP!!  We’ve a few formalities to go through but thank you to the National Lottery Awards for All (and to everyone who buys lottery tickets) for £8700!

The building will be a vital part of making our garden more accessible to people who want to be involved all year but can’t really cope with the cold weather- sometimes even our hardiest volunteers have had to leave sooner than they’d like because of feet so cold they hurt. This winter we’ll be able to sit back, drink tea, leaf through seed catalogues in our cosy cob building and wriggle our toes in front of the stove. Of course we’ll have to build it first and that’ll be the fun part! Anyone with any interest in eco building get in touch. It’ll be a community effort and an amazing learning opportunity and we’ll probably get started in September.

MORE exciting up and coming dates, still there’s still a few places left on the Pests, Diseases, Weeds and Problems workshop on the 23rd June AND the cob pizza oven building is still planned for 6th July and 23rd July 10am – 4pm – an great opportunity to learn how to make a cob pizza oven for free!! But numbers are limited so let me know if you want to be involved!

 

Okay this post is already too long so I’ve save the info about the summer playscheme for 7-14 year olds for the next one and I’ll just quickly finish by saying a worker from Freeways supported housing recently described the Golden Hill Community Garden as place where “Everyone values everyone and nobody judges anyone”.  That’s something for all of us involved to be really proud of, and if you’re not involved yet- come be part of this special place!

See you in the garden,

Lucy