I woke up Sunday morning with fixed purpose of getting to the allotment and starting to organise all the plastic, wood, metal, paper and other stuff ready to get taken off site. After all sorts of delays, with friends popping round for coffee and lunch, I got there just after one. Then lots of visitors came to see me on the allotment – neighbouring plotholders, the allotment committee people, a friend from the gym with her own allotment and then by 3.30 Gary arrived to help, pissed off that Hibs lost 1-0 to Motherwell. But soon he was getting stuck in to the dismantling. A plot neighbour offered all sorts of tools, mallet, pickaxe, choppers – in return I let her dig up one of the rhubarb plants to transplant to her allotment. These are an old and rare variety of rhubarb which is very tasty. Next year hopefully we will have a good crop of this.  Advice from everyone was to have a great onsite bonfire of the wood,  on top of the ground elder if possible to help get rid of that.  The metal is worth money and could go to Willie Waugh’s Granton scrap yard where we will be paid real money for it.  And so  it was agreed that there would be a communal  allotment bonfire on our plot on the 18th August, with tatties, music, and other fun. Unfortunately we wont be there as we are off to Mull for long weekend. Next Saturday is clearing day.

Before I left I got blackcurrants and redcurrants and made a lovely sauce out of them. The plum trees are set to deliver a bumper crop – none at all last year I was told, so this is very lucky for us.  Plum  Autumn ahead