October 2012
Working Weekend 
- Date:
- 5 – 7 October
- Price:
- No Charge
This is also our Apple Weekend so we will need help with the juice pressing, the apple–themed café, organising some apple crafts, as well as some of the usual working weekend tasks.
This is a chance to get to know the farm, turn your hand to old jobs and new, enjoy good company and good food too!
Our Working Weekends are run in the beautiful spirit of the wonderful WWOOF organisation: we feed and accommodate you, you work, with us. No money changes hands.
An opportunity to have bright ideas by the compost heap, happy talk in the hen house, and cool chat in the kitchen. Join us to prove that many hands make light work and that today’s stranger is tomorrow’s friend.
For more information on WWOOF, see www.wwoof.org.uk.
Book Working Weekend!Apple Days – a weekend of apple antics and apple action! 
- Date:
- 6th and 7th October
- Time:
- 11am to 4pm Saturday, 10.30am – 3pm Sunday
- Entry:
- Adults £3, Children £2 (includes snack, drink, and farm fun)
Note. B&B provided, £25, for Friday and/or Saturday night.
Two days to celebrate apples. There will be apple pressing, apple cooking, apple eating, apple stories, apple music, apple poems, and even apple juggling and apple jokes. Core blimey!
Bring your own apples, to cut, to scrat, to press, and to turn into juice, to drink, to take home, or to ferment!
Join other apple–lovers for this annual celebration of all things apple.
This weekend, presented in partnership with SCAN and other brilliant locally–active organisations, will also be a chance to discover local growing groups and enjoy locally–produced foods from local food–stalls. Mmm. Tasty!
Mushrooms or Toadstools? 
- with…
- Dr Patrick Harding and Jean Binney
- Date:
- 12 – 14 October
- Price:
- £141
In the woods, on the downs, and in the fields of north Wiltshire, over 100 different species of mushrooms and toadstools have been found.
Fungi are neither plants, nor animals. Whatever you like to call them – mushrooms, toadstools, truffles, champignons, or bolets – they belong to the fungal kingdom. Britain boasts more than 4,000 different species, including those that are edible, poisonous, beautiful, bizarre, or just plain hallucinogenic!
On this weekend, we shall explore fungal habitats, learn how to identify the big, the bad, and the edible ones while discovering their innumerable medicinal and culinary uses; the latter tested by way of fantastic fry–ups. All this and slide shows too!
Allow the miracles of mycelia and the fables of fungi both to instruct and delight you. They will and they do!
Patrick is the author of four books on fungi and a regular speaker, broadcaster, and tutor on the subject.
Jean is an experienced tutor in botanical art and is happy to encourage and assist participants of all artistic abilities to draw and paint their fungal finds.
Book Mushrooms or Toadstools!Singing Workshop 
- Date:
- 19 – 21 October
- Price:
- £141
- with…
- Mella Faye and Jennifer Bell
This exciting weekend workshop is for singers who want to improve their ability in close–harmony ensemble singing and explore their own vocal world, with other singers.
It will focus on styles of a cappella, singing techniques, developing an understanding of harmony and arranging, and playing with composition for a cappella.
Workshop leaders will be Mella Faye, a Brighton based composer and musician, who has been running a cappella classes and working for professional choirs for over a decade; and Jennifer Bell, a Bristol–based composer and conductor of three choirs, with eight years’ experience singing in a cappella ensembles.
This will be a weekend of vocal exploration, learning, fun, and singing, together!
Book Singing Workshop!Autumn Family Craft Weekend 
- Date:
- 26 – 28 October
- Price:
- Adult £132 • Child £81
This is a weekend for families, for parents and children of all ages.
As the season turns and nights draw in, we mark the change by getting together to make and do Autumn things. We shall carve and hollow pumpkins and fill them with light, decorate little lanterns to shine brightly and drive away the darkness, harvest apples and turn them into golden juice, light fires and make fire sculptures to remind us of the sun, create shadow plays that tell stories in silhouette, build campfires and tell stories that warm the heart, and play autumn games that fan the flames of human imagination.
A weekend for all ages to get together and be imaginative, and have fun,in autumn!
The weekend begins on Friday evening and finishes after lunch on the Sunday.
Book Autumn Family Craft Weekend!“There is little doubt that we will be back again!!” Isabelle