Oh my aching back!

I'm so envious of this strip of vegetable garden perched high above the old harbour and I always peep over the wall to admire it when I'm walking past on the road. It's meticulously organised with vegetable rows, compost makers, water butts, sheds, cold frames and a seed bed here being tended by a somewhat spinally-challenged gardener.

It's a perfect site, sloping gently to the west in full sun and sheltered to the east by the wall. All the traditional vegetables appear in their season: beans, potatoes, lettuces and leeks. I once asked who owned the garden and was told a very old man who had cultivated it since the 1940s. Now he seems to have others to do it for him - sons and sons-in-law perhaps.

I love growing vegetables and in the past have expended huge amounts of time and energy on gardens which have been a) shady, b) damp and slug-ridden, c) beset with roots, stones and perennial weeds. Now I've given up the struggle but I still hanker after this particular plot.

The flowers on the wall are Red Valerian.Centranthus ruber, which is pretty-much ubiquitous in these parts.