Wow!!! An eventful month - Dominated by the railway clean-up, HAMPSTEAD upgrades and Yippee – Another phase of irrigation in. Tom’s Bench finally in and looking good!
The 17 May, a crisp autumn morning, saw a gathering of about 50 folks outside Fat Harrry’s to enjoy their excellent coffee and a bacon baps, from Graze, before setting off down the railway line from Kenilworth Station - black bag in hand and litter being the mission.
The 2015 Harfield Railway Clean-up had begun. Cllr Iverson and James Fernie both turned up to do their bit, along with a contingent from Metrorail, SAPS, Wynberg Girls and Bergvliet High. 3 Hours and 100 Black bags later – it was done! Participants were rewarded with Pizza from Oblivion, Caribbean soup from Banana Jam, Rolls, apples and water from Metrorail and one lucky lady, won the Lucky Draw of R500 cash sponsored by Norgarb Properties.
Big thanks to Joy Skene who carted 16 loads of bags back to the collection point. What a pleasure to drive past the station and see neatly trimmed areas free of litter and the Aloe garden neatly revamped.
We were however disappointed in the low turnout by Harfield residents – with only about 20 locals arriving. Trusting that next year more of you will be there and two hours will see the job done and leave some time for a bit of neighbor chit chat.
Hampstead - Our focus park for May - We would love to hand over small sections of each park to some adoptive garden parents to do their thing.
Hampstead is a shining example of what can be achieved this way – Tina’s bed on 3rd Ave (in front of the green wall) is doing so well, as is The Secret Garden that Ingrid and Tamsin care for.
Mandy would have been thrilled to hear a little girl – dragging mom by the hand – saying – “Please can we go and visit the fairy castle” – loving created by Mandy and Ingrid and a total delight for kids.
The veg garden in Hampstead and herb spiral in Surrey are nurtured by myself and Francine, we both have a passion for the “Food is Free” philosophy – and we have been hugely supported with these projects. We have been very excited to see Gabriella Garnette’s Patchwork page on Facebook, grow to 63 within 1 month – Harfielders who are growing their own veg.
Hampstead had another park picnic table added and two benches installed on the section closest to 3rd Ave – yes we know they do not face the view – but they were placed in the shade. We will be installing some lovely, all a wooden benches, like Tom’s that faces the lovely view of the mountains. Currently in negotiation with one of our generous business supports for this. The veg section has also been fenced off to protect it from too much dog traffic.
Big thanks to Brian Cruz who come along to the Hampstead work party armed with his metal detector – the kids were thrilled and turned up some marvelous treasure.
Purley Park
Tom’s bench is finally in at his park - Purley and a great way to remember this special Harfield Hero!
Princes Park - the hard work of the committee and the generosity of our friends has enabled us to complete the 2nd phase of irrigation in Princes Park – it is now completely under timed irrigation and set to be looking as good as Surrey Park by this time next year.
Surrey Park – is looking gorgeous and has had two additional pop ups added to its irrigation system and it now reaches the back bed and the section of the herb spiral that was going dry. Once again Cllr Kempthorne stepped forward and found a bit of ward budget for this as well as getting our trellising installed for the Jasmine creepers to cover the graffiti walls and the test compost bin is back
The Very First Annual Harfield Garden Competition will taking place in September with final voting day 1st weekend in Oct - the 5 categories will be traditional garden, pavement garden, complex garden, veg garden and patio garden –Prizes are going to be awesome so – good time to put on that planning cap and watch out for entry forms from 1st June.
For the rest - winter is upon us and this is the time the committee put their feet up, so no more work parties till August. Our last work party was, I know on a long weekend, a bit short of volunteers – we would love to see more of you, once we start up again. Please tell us how we can entice you to join in future park gardening parties?
Keep Warm and Keep Planting
Gail Brown
Chairperson