Unfortunately we had to leave early as J and N were coming for lunch – but I left a gooseberry pie for the Lochgoilhead ‘Bake off’. Unfortunately I don’t think it was a winner as at least one of the others looked much nicer.

Anyway – there was homemade soup, bread, assorted preserves (including Donich plum jam and chutney from me) and it looks like a promising venue for the future. I certainly have some experiences to share from gardening here on the edge of the wilderness for the last year.

I will need to put the solitary squash into a curry or something – not that it is really even worth the effort of preparing it. I think next year I will not bother growing these…

Not sure what variety it is but it has a crisp white flesh and a red skin, and it was in fact ready. I cut it in half and gave half to R who regarded it with great suspicion and examined it closely for potential bugs before deigning to eat it (in fact apples and raisins are about the only fruit he will eat). I gently pointed out that the ones from the supermarkets come off trees as well – to which his rejoinder was that ‘Supermarkets spray their stuff with so much crap that creepy crawlies wouldn’t come near them’. I’ll try to take that as a compliment to our organic garden produce….

We have another tree of eaters and two trees of cookers to come – though one of the latter only has about 3 fruit on it. There is also an abandoned orchard on the path to Ardentinny where I will see if I can pick some more. It’s a sad reflection on modern times that when I was a child anything vaguely edible growing in the hedgerow was stripped by children and consumed even before it was properly ripe – but now no one seems to even touch it. I don’t know whether it is just that children today have so much rubbish to eat easily accessible to them that they don’t bother with fruit and nuts – or whether there is just a lack of knowledge or interest that the stuff is there.

This evening R mowed the lawn (which doesn’t seem to be taking the hint about autumn and is still growing apace) and I cleared the decking of many of the annuals which had just gone to seed.

It was actually one of the nicest evenings I have seen – cool but bright (perhaps 12 degrees with the sun full out at 8pm). In general far more pleasant than a month ago when you just couldn’t have stood in the garden for more than about 30 seconds because of the midges.

In a way it is quite sad because summer is nearly over (and we are still not saved), but in a way I am glad because I think I like Lochgoilhead better out of season. It would be sensational if we could have a cold crisp autumn with morning frosts.

Tomorrow evening I will try to get my first crop of brambles. We nearly lost the apples to go with them yesterday when a small herd of red deer seemed to be getting perilously close to them – luckily R managed to chase them off. He calls them ‘the tick bags’ – I quite like them though if they attack my apples I may quickly change my opinion.

So all the food at the moment has a tomato theme. A few days ago I made home made pizzas – bases made from scratch with organic flour, and the sauce from home grown tomatoes and onions. R then spoilt the whole healthy eating part of it by choosing his topping as haggis.

The main picture is a healthy bowl of tomatoes – guess what the other picture is of…..

For some reason I don’t think my Chili peppers are going to bear fruit – they are only going into flower now so I am not sure they are going to have time to develop a decent crop before Winter comes (guess who has been watching ‘Game of Thrones’ recently).

Produce aside – the garden doesn’t look as nice in July as it did in June – most of the flowers are over and everything is very very very green. The water lilies are still fantastic though.

The apples and plums are coming along nicely as well. I also noticed on the walk to Ardentinny last week that there is a old abandoned cottage with an overgrown orchard where we should be able to get many more apples – I have grand plans for making some nice jellies come autumn as we are going to have more brambles than we can pick.

Last but not least – I noticed on one of my walks that there are some wild nuts growing by the lochside – not sure if they are hazels or filberts but there should be good eating on them either way.

It was interesting to see a few differences between here and Cambridge (apart from the obvious ones like the lack of mountains). Firstly, they are definitely a few weeks ahead of us climate-wise. For example the Buddleia is in full blossom there and is just opening here. They can also grow some things outside we wouldn’t stand much of a chance of (see the picture of the apricot tree). Sadly another thing I noticed down there was the almost complete absence of bees and butterflies. Whilst our garden is constantly abuzz with its insect population – the gardens down there are eerily silent. I’d like to hope that this is just because it is in a town – but from all I have heard it is a general problem in England.

Back here it is now high summer – I’ve never seen anything so green as our garden and the woods beyond. The tomato plants in the polytunnel are groaning under the weight of the green tomatoes and we have a few outlying ones that have already ripened. I also picked the first courgettes and beans today – although they haven’t done as well as I had hoped, probably because I had hoped to put them outside and as the slugs changed that plan the pots they are in are too small.

R and I walked down to the loch this afternoon and I had a paddle. While I was doing this, we heard the sound of a piper striking up with ‘Over the sea to Skye’ from the other side of the loch where there is a wedding venue. It was an extraordinarily poetic and romantic moment. And then we had ice creams on the way home – perfect.

To my recollection, neither of these ever made it as far as being cooked. The peapods never made it out of the garden at all, and the turnips got there only to be peeled with a knife and then eaten like an apple. They were so tender and good

My Gran and Pop are long since passed away and buried just down the road from here in Cardross, but today I had some of my own peapods and a snowball turnip out of the garden and they tasted just as good as they did forty years ago. I got to thinking about how strange it is that the world has changed out of all reckoning since then, and yet in other ways is just the same.

The herbs in particular smell completely different when picked in handfuls from the garden rather than bought wrapped up in plastic from the supermarket – and it certainly removes the waste factor of having to buy a whole packet because you need two sprigs of it.

Anyway – I should have done a third picture of an empty plate – but I will just say ‘Yum!!’ and now get back to my work.