Pumpkins and penny sweets.

Pumpkins can be fickle creatures at Hill Top, some years they grow like Topsy and threaten to take over the whole garden and other years they seem to just sit and sulk for weeks before reluctantly producing a few bowling ball sized fruits. This year hasn't been great, I only managed to produce two decent sized pumpkins, one of which was snaffled by Jess for the Wray Castle halloween shop display and another smaller one which I've left 'on display' in the garden too long and is slowly being eaten by slugs.

This years pumpkins - must try harder next year.

The pumpkins I grow at Hill Top are the French heirloom variety 'Rouge Vif d'Etampes which are yellowy orange 'cinderella' type and in a good year will produce 4 or 5 large fruits per plant. 
I usually sow the seeds in the greenhouse in May and plant the seedlings out in mid June but they can also be sown in late April directly in the soil. Either way it's a good idea to make a planting pocket by digging a hole about 30cm square and filling it with a mixture of compost or well-rotted manure and soil. Add some general purpose fertiliser too if you've got some. If you've grown plants in the greenhouse, make sure you harden them off before planting them out.
Once they're established, it's just a matter of feeding every couple of weeks with a high potash fertilizer once the fruits appear and making sure they have plenty of water. 
If you don't have a garden you can even grow pumpkins in a growbag.

Spooky spider's web!

The association between halloween and pumpkins and the rise of 'trick or treating' is, like Miley Cyrus, a recent (and some would say unwelcome) American import. When I was growing up in the 1960's only the really well-off kids had pumpkins, we had to make do with the more traditional hollowed out turnip (I'm not joking here - anyone under 40, ask your parents)! If you've ever tried hollowing out a turnip you can imagine the number of cuts and stab wounds which resulted from the combination of small children, sharp knives and rock hard root vegetables - never was the Blue Peter advice 'get a grown-up to help you' more appropriate!
Having hollowed out our turnips and bandaged our fingers, a string handle was attached, a candle placed inside and the turnip lid put on. This was invariably followed by the acrid smell of burning turnip as the flame from your Mum's 'power cut candle'  slowly cooked the turnip lid (tea lights hadn't been invented in the '60s kids).
The more entrepreneurial children would then set off around the estate stopping at houses and reciting the enchanting verse

"The sky is blue
 The grass is green
 Can you spare a penny for Halloween"

The 24p profit from an evening trudging round in the drizzle was spent the next day on Curly Wurlys, Black Jacks and white mice (again - under 40's- ask your parents) or sometimes a box of bangers to be let off well before bonfire night (don't do it kids, it's not big or clever).

Autumn colours

Anyway, I digress! Elsewhere in the garden the Autumn colours are in full swing. The Crimson Glory vine on the pub wall has been...er...glorious, as have the deciduous azaleas. The Eucryphia and the Enkianthus are just colouring up now but the Wisteria on the house is staying steadfastly green, probably kept warm by the warmth from the south facing wall.

Flower-wise, the Michaelmas daisies have given up and the soapwort is all but over. Rose 'Felicia' is still bravely flowering as are the Evening Primroses and the Pot Marigolds. My runner beans, still not killed off by frost, were blown over in the tail end of hurricane Gonzalo.

Glory-ous

Hill Top house closes on Sunday, although the garden and shop are open right through to Christmas eve, so with fewer visitors around, the hard work of cutting back the borders, lifting and dividing perennials and digging over the vegetable garden can begin. My fingers are crossed for a nice dry, frosty winter.

With all this talk of Halloween my musical link this week had to have a spooky theme so I could have gone for 'Walking With a Ghost' by The White Stripes or 'Ghost Train' by Elvis Costello or even the very obscure 'Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead by XTC but in the end I couldn't decide between the old school Halloween-ness of this or the rather tenuous Trick or Treatiness of this (skip the advert).

Happy Halloween and see you next time.

Words and pictures by Pete the Gardener

Hallowscream!

Wray Castle has been a hive of activity this week. On Monday we hosted the South Lakes Orchard Group's annual apple pressing day. Rob and Andy brought a selection of locally grown apples and made some amazingly delicious apple juices for everyone to try. We were lucky enough to be left a bottle of juice at the end of the day, which we have been supping in between tours and helping out with the craft activities!

Yum Yum freshly pressed apple juice!



The presser in action!

As well as apple day, this week at the castle has been Halloween themed. Visitors, both young and old have enjoyed making witches and wizards hats, scary masks, creepy spiders and Halloween lanterns. We have also been entertaining visitors after hours with ghostly story telling sessions. Richard and Luke have been a great double act, both dressed in appropriately scary costumes and regaling guests with stories of skulls, severed hands and haunted tea pots! In the cold Autumn evening, victims-I mean, of course, visitors, found themselves in the dimly lit gothic hallway of Wray Castle and were greeted by the ghastly Black monk of Furness-Abbey and a young Undertaker's apprentice who took great pleasure in measuring guests for their coffins! 

Wray Castle's resident undertaker!



One of our most popular activities has been the broom stick making. When Richard the Ranger volunteered his skills to do this back in May I am not sure he quite realised what was in store for him!

Have you ever wondered what it would feel like to make over 100 broom sticks in 5 hours?? Well Richard no longer needs to ponder that question as he has spent two days at the castle this week doing exactly that! On Monday it seemed like a one man production line, but luckily reinforcements arrived as their were some very keen would be witches and wizards all eager to make their own broom stick.

Richard hard at work. Only 55 more to go!

A happy 'witch' with a rather large broom stick!

This is our last week of 7 day opening; but we are going to be open on weekends all the way up until the 23rd of december. There will be lots more craft activities and a giant christmas tree to decorate, so do come along and have some fun!

Be prepared to be scared!

                HALLOWEEEEEEEEN!

When you have a mock gothic castle with spooky towers, creaking doors, dark passages and a clattering* of jackdaws it is not hard to get into the halloween spirit. With the nights drawing in and a crescent moon rising over the castle it is certainly a creepy place to be. So, what could be scarier than ghost stories, told as night falls around Wray Castle? Anyone with a nervous disposition (me!) may want to avoid this, but if you are over 12 and think you are brave enough then come and join us for our spine-chilling story sessions on Monday the 29th, Wednesday the 31st and Friday the 2nd. Starting at 5.30 pm. To get you in the mood, listen to one of our special 'Halloween sounds' on Audioboo.

Keep your eyes peeled for witches and wizards!

For the whole week from Saturday the 27th of October until the 4th of November, we will also have a variety of craft activities for all the family to get involved with. You can try your hand at broom stick making, witch/wizard hat making, spider making or simply enjoy dressing up in our scary halloween costumes.

You may spot some bats flying around the castle as dusk approaches.

There's also lots happening out in the grounds at Wray Castle too, you can join a guided walk around the estate, try out our giant rope swing or build yourself a den in our activity area. On Monday the 29th we are also hosting Apple Pressing Day, so come and see fresh apple juice being made before your very eyes!

For more information on any of our activities, please see our website
http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/wray-castle/things-to-see-and-do/events/ or email wraycastle@nationaltrust.org.uk or go to our Wray Castle Facebook page

(*that's the official collective noun for Jackdaws!)