CAMERA CAPERS

A warm and sunny day in mid-July saw members from the village garden club on their yearly coach outing.  This year we had two gardens to visit.  First was a private garden just south of Petworth in West Sussex.  This was a quirky cottage garden with lots of interesting items of sculpture and odd items almost hidden amongst the borders, up on the trunks of an old conifer and on the roof of an outhouse.  Of course, there were lots of plants. A novel wood store - and I loved the Hare on top. The owner's art studio - she had several paintings for sale here. The owner had a collection of vintage cars - here is the chassis of an old vehicle and he intends to use it to build an old Bentley racing car as in the famous photo behind of W O Bentley in his racing car.  Incidentally, W O Bentley used to live in Shamley Green. Several of us would have liked to take this bench home with us.  Aren't the bears cute? ...

My friend Anne, from Sweden, and I were invited to stay for the weekend at Fibrex Nurseries, where the Pelargonium & Geranium Society (PAGS) were once again holding their Annual National Show.  Anne arrived here on a Wednesday evening, and we travelled up to Fibrex together the next day.  We spent Friday helping the staff at the nursery get ready for the show - setting up tables and chairs, sweeping out glasshouses, and trying not to get in the way. I had 'volunteered' Anne to Steward at the show.  This is something I like to do and as we were short of Stewards, I volunteered her.  She was very happy to do this and as I thought, felt it was a great experience to see how the judges here judge the plants.  So very early - 8.15 am - we were both in the show tent ready for the judging to start at 8.30.  Basically, a Steward, usually two, goes around with a judge to assist and to take the award tickets to the Show Secretary's desk for the marks to be colla...