September sunshine
I don't think I have ever written a blog on such a beautiful day and on my way to work this morning I wished I had had more time to stop and enjoy the scenery. The Summer Isles have as much "wow" factor as Halong Bay, in Vietnam, and this morning Jules had a group of sea kayakers paddling in the bay in Altandhu. Oh how lovely it would have been to be with them!
We are absolutely delighted that we finally received planning consent for our new visitor centre. By mid October the diggers will arrive on site - we will need to get some hard hats and hi-vis jackets! Mmm, wonder if we can get Alison's mum to put logos on them?
Margaret has been busy designing aprons and bags for us - Di has been using her bag and has had a few order enquiries. Once happy with sizes etc I think she plans to go into production!
Our summer hasn't been great at all and at one point it felt as if we should get some more water butts connected to harvest all that rain! Wish we had as they are almost empty due to a combination of heat and the plants being so huge and thirsty! Despite the weather we have welcomed lots of visitors to the growing house. With so much growing in hydroponics and soil there has been lots to see. Many are amazed at how we manage to grow so much without being connected to mains electricity and water.
Di has done us proud with providing fantastic produce for selling to the local shops, hotel, cafe and to visitors to the growing house. This summer Lizzie and Richard, on Tanera, have been using our produce for Tanera nights restaurant evenings, guests on residential courses and during the day in the cafe. Alison and I have been catering for Jules's guests and they have loved the range of produce, including the Arran Victory potatoes - a fantastic potato that makes wonderful mash (and chips!). As well as our tasty salads and herbs our produce has included peas, potatoes, beans, courgettes, cucumbers, cabbage, kale, strawberries and flavour packed tomatoes.
Next Friday we are guest speakers at the National Trust of Scotland's Head Gardeners Conference. We have been invited to make a presentation about the Sustainability of Achiltibuie Garden. It will be a new experience for us and will have to have a crash course in powerpoint I think! On the Sunday we have a group of Belgian visitors coming to look round the growing house - they wanted to come despite there being no visitor centre.
We are introducing a Loyalty Scheme for our customers - collect one leaf everytime you spend £10 in a single transaction (excluding P&P). Once you have ten leaves we will treat the Loyalty card as a £5 voucher redeemable against your next purchase.
Achiltibuie Garden is to be one of the venues for Macmillan Cancer Support's World's Largest Coffee Morning - a day late due to give more people the chance to come along. Collette (one of my fellow charity walkers) is organising it and needed an alternative venue as our community hall is not available that day. It will be a challenge as we have no mains electricity, so camping stoves to ready I think.
On that note, I think it's time for a cuppa!
Bye from sunny Coigach.
Julie
We are absolutely delighted that we finally received planning consent for our new visitor centre. By mid October the diggers will arrive on site - we will need to get some hard hats and hi-vis jackets! Mmm, wonder if we can get Alison's mum to put logos on them?
Margaret has been busy designing aprons and bags for us - Di has been using her bag and has had a few order enquiries. Once happy with sizes etc I think she plans to go into production!
Our summer hasn't been great at all and at one point it felt as if we should get some more water butts connected to harvest all that rain! Wish we had as they are almost empty due to a combination of heat and the plants being so huge and thirsty! Despite the weather we have welcomed lots of visitors to the growing house. With so much growing in hydroponics and soil there has been lots to see. Many are amazed at how we manage to grow so much without being connected to mains electricity and water.
Di has done us proud with providing fantastic produce for selling to the local shops, hotel, cafe and to visitors to the growing house. This summer Lizzie and Richard, on Tanera, have been using our produce for Tanera nights restaurant evenings, guests on residential courses and during the day in the cafe. Alison and I have been catering for Jules's guests and they have loved the range of produce, including the Arran Victory potatoes - a fantastic potato that makes wonderful mash (and chips!). As well as our tasty salads and herbs our produce has included peas, potatoes, beans, courgettes, cucumbers, cabbage, kale, strawberries and flavour packed tomatoes.
Next Friday we are guest speakers at the National Trust of Scotland's Head Gardeners Conference. We have been invited to make a presentation about the Sustainability of Achiltibuie Garden. It will be a new experience for us and will have to have a crash course in powerpoint I think! On the Sunday we have a group of Belgian visitors coming to look round the growing house - they wanted to come despite there being no visitor centre.
We are introducing a Loyalty Scheme for our customers - collect one leaf everytime you spend £10 in a single transaction (excluding P&P). Once you have ten leaves we will treat the Loyalty card as a £5 voucher redeemable against your next purchase.
Achiltibuie Garden is to be one of the venues for Macmillan Cancer Support's World's Largest Coffee Morning - a day late due to give more people the chance to come along. Collette (one of my fellow charity walkers) is organising it and needed an alternative venue as our community hall is not available that day. It will be a challenge as we have no mains electricity, so camping stoves to ready I think.
On that note, I think it's time for a cuppa!
Bye from sunny Coigach.
Julie
posted by Achiltibuie Garden at
12:10
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