The green and rolling countryside of Worcestershire, England, is home to the cider apple orchards which surround the gardens of Pear Tree Cottage. They enjoy a sunny south westerly aspect with sweeping views across to Martley Hillside, Woodbury and Abberley clock tower. The Teme Valley lies just over the hill and, not far away, is the Herefordshire border. Although our climate is temperate, our seasons are often uncertain and always a challenge to a gardener! This began in 2010 & follows the weekly ups and downs of garden work chronicling both successes and failures but, above all, demonstrates the fun enjoyed by three people who regularly garden in all weathers

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19 January 2018

The Great Wall of Witton Hill!

The previous upturned concrete slabs
Hey presto! (Spot the dreaded vent!)


Despite all the recent freezing temperatures, Chris Genever has very busy behind the garage. Before he commenced operations, we had a narrow slabbed path and concrete slabs on end used to retain the hedge bank. As this path is the main wheelbarrow access to the top of the garden, we hated its narrow width and we hated even more scraping our knuckles against a metal vet protruding from the garage wall at exactly hand height when pushing a barrow! 

'Tile creasing'
Perfection.
In no time at all the old concrete retaining slabs disappeared only to be replaced with a really pretty brick wall with a slight curve which now widens the path at the site of the dreaded metal vent. 

Check out the mortar colour!
Abandoning Chris with his new uncapped wall for a trip to Birmingham, imagine my surprise to find that he had capped the top of the wall in its entirety with the prettiest little blue triangular Victorian capping bricks in the whole world! He even dyed the mortar to blend in and capped the piers with proportionately larger sized matching bricks. The gate post which had rotted off at ground level is now securely fixed to the side of the pier and it all looks really lovely and a huge improvement. Thanks very much indeed Chris - you're a star!

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