We had lovely day today - well, I did. We spent about five hours at the allotment doing various bits and pieces. The tame photographer was on hand to help, but did spend a bit of time on the internet (via his laptop). I find if he is happily occupied, there is less urgency about returning home!

I weeded - a constant task - and watered (another constant task) and prepared the soil and planted out my purple sprouting broccoli seedlings (which I had sown myself at home). I have planted out 9 plants. I don't know how many more I will need - but I am going to sow some green sprouting broccoli - some maybe another 9 plants will be enough. We also netted the broccoli. I think we spend about as much time netting things, as any other task (except weeding and watering!). The tame photographer devised a neat way of netting the strawberries. He has put foot high stakes in each corner of the bed and a nail in the top of each stake. The netting then gets hooked over the nail, and thus reduces the need for bricks and other things to hold the netting in place. He says to mention that he didn't invent this system, but copied it from one of the ace gardeners on the site.

I can't believe this is all we did in the time - but I was busy the whole time, except for a brief break for lunch - egg sandwiches, banana and ginger cake, plus coffee in a flask.

We also harvested - broad beans (which came to 1lb when shelled), turnips, radishes, masses of lettuce (tom thumb and salad bowl), strawberries and the rest of the kohlrabi (most of which I will freeze) and 1 1/2 lbs of new potatoes. Yesterday I picked another 1/2lb of broad beans (when shelled), spinach and radishes.

What is rather surprising about the allotments - and we have noticed this on several occasions - is that the place is almost deserted on weekend afternoons no matter how lovely the weather is. There is always a smattering of people working on their plots, but I would expect far more people to be there when the weather is as glorious as it was today. I'm not complaining, however, as the peace and quiet is to kill for.

Pictures to follow.