Train Rec

This weekend finally saw us finish landscaping the town and, so, begin work on the diesel depot.

We had to abandon the idea of a crazy golf course in the triangle of land that we had left since the area did prove to be too small. We will, therefore, now include this in the northern half of the layout when we start work rebuilding that next year.

So, instead of a golf course, we made this into a recreational area for children which includes, amongst other things: swings, a slide, a roundabout and a sand pit.

With the need to keep the kids amused at all times, we also placed a play train and a see-saw on to the lawns of the the tea rooms as there was not enough space for these to be included in the playground. Whether these items will stay where they are we are not too sure but, for now, we are happy with them there.

Obviously there is still much more to be done in the town before it is considered complete - people, lighting, cars, road signs and, most importantly, water in the lake and river, all need to be added!

However, these things can be done gradually over the ensuing weeks because, for now, we want to get as much work done on the depot as possible before we take our annual break over Christmas and the New Year.

In the lower photograph you can see that we have temporarily laid the track and placed cardboard templates where buildings will be. Unfortunately, space constraints mean that the track layout is not exactly as we would have wanted but we are happy with what we can do here and it will certainly add another area of interest to the layout.

You will note that we have also started building the bridge that crosses the line that feeds into the depot, and which acts to separate the depot from the rest of the layout. 

We plan to continue building this bridge and creating the embankment on either side of same at the weekend so I should have more to report on this next week.