On Saturday 10th July a group of us will be heading out to Brogdale Farm near Faversham in the Garden of England in order to visit the National Fruit Collection:
The National Fruit Collection is one of the largest fruit collections in the world and includes over 3,500 named Apple, Pear, Plum, Cherry, Bush fruit, Vine and Cob Nut cultivars. Located at Brogdale Farm, near Faversham (Kent), the collection is owned by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and is part of an international programme to protect plant genetic resources for the future.
The plan is to have a guided tour of the orchards and hopefully learn lots of useful information about the different cultivars, caring for trees and other interesting things. There’s also a chery festival going on that weekend so there will be a lot of stuffing of faces with lovely, fresh cherries.
Trains from St Pancras to Favesham are £22 return but groups of 4 can travel for the price of 2 thanks to the excellent GroupSave offer so it should be about £11 return. A tour of the orchard will cost about £7.
If you’re interested in coming along then please drop us a line by Sunday so that we can let Brogdale know about numbers. We’re hoping to organise another trip later in the autumn so you won’t miss out if you can’t make this one.