Andrew

All looks promising, Barry. A couple of thoughts. The temporary can tend to become permanent, so you might want to make some allowance for that from the outset rather than committing to replace everything as part of the plan. The sidings at your terminus don't look as long as the passing loop. If there was scope to have the station parallel to the front edge of the decking you might have more length available. If you could get the line to run behind that variegated green patch so that the curve starts from up against the boundary, there might be more length available for the main station. As for the main station, does it need to be a terminus? One of the characteristics of a garden railway is that operators (and your visitors) enjoy watching trains running round a continuous circuit, rather than doing detailed shunting which is better performed indoors. Some people (i.e. me) start with a continuous circuit and find that gives so much of what they wanted that anything further is a bit of an afterthought...

A 1.5 minute video of the King

Piling on the coal again Here's the BR Standard 4MT waiting at Throstlebeck for departure with a coal train, alongside one of the recently arrived and very elegant ground signals which really improve the general appearance. and later caught (from a drone) passing Black Ghyll:

Great Western delight What a pleasure to have the first visiting locos of the year, especially Julian's finely wrought models. And some visiting lower quadrant signals too. King William IV enjoying the sunshine: Earl of Mount Edgcumbe pauses near a shunting signal: Details of the Earl's cab and tender: A small Prairie drifts down Bamboo Curtain Straight: and Resolven Grange heads home with a coal train with a glimpse of the driver, eager for supper: The end:

Hello, Noel, it's this: Mind-your-own-business or baby’s tears, Soleirolia soleirolii (syn. Helxine soleirolii) is a creeping perennial with tiny rounded leaves. Despite looking pretty in cracks in paving, it re-grows from the smallest stem sections and can soon get out of control. It is especially difficult to control in the lawn. https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?pid=348 But I may have let it get too dried out (or a spark from a passing train may have started a fire, as you can see if you scroll up).

Just a few pics from today's 1950s running session Nothing too unusual in the locomotive department: this Black 5 on Foxdale Bank and here on Bamboo Curtain Straight And a couple of shots of the 9F on a coal train at Throstlebeck I've just noticed one of those junction signals is facing the wrong way. Wonder how that happened!

That looks incredible, Thomas. How long is it?

Great to see that 11-car train. Well done.

Great to see a train running. And the cats will probably appreciate the right of way as well.

That ballast looks good. The size looks right, and hiding the ends of the sleepers looks most realistic. I like the colour, and the variegated effect. Just wondering how it's fixed - and how weatherproof it will be.

Just found this old negative from about 60 years ago...

The video from yesterday's run:

Only one train today, and no sunshine to brighten up the photos. At first I thought it might be the Thames-Clyde Express, but research shows it can't be, as that had a restaurant car in the 1950s. So this is just an anonymous express with no refreshment facilities, pulled by a very clean Jubilee. Here it's seen passing Black Ghyll cavern, and then beyond. There seems to have been a lineside fire on Foxdale Bank, presumbly caused by the proverbial stray spark from a locomotive.

All looking very promising. Keep up the good work, and let's hope for more fine weather. The design of the layout looks great, as it will be really handy to be able to shunt in the garage and marshall the trains indoors. But it occurs to me that if you ever have one-man-operation, you won't be able to enjoy the outdoor section while monitoring the trains safely through the junctions inside the garage. Mind you, Mick seems to manage similar issues alright, so it should be fine. Worst case would be that you could build a garage bypass loop!