Over the last week I knuckled down and finished laying the setts around the goods yard. Now, to be honest, setts are probably not something you'd get in the sort of sleepy, rural goods yard I have in mind here - I would expect a surface of dirt or gravel at best - but since the shed has to be removable, setts help hide the inevitable joins.

In fact, the shed fits into a dedicated area of setts which is itself removable, hence the line visible under the front wheel of the GWR vehicle. The point of this is that I can substitute a smaller shed, yet still have it look bedded into the ground, whereas it would have been tricky to conceal such a join in a dirt-type surface. Again the idea is to be able to swap between companies or regions without too much hassle.

The main goods siding projects through the shed and continues for a bit, where I've added a set of coal staithes for a bit of shunting variety. Now, this is again a tad unlikely as it would be cumbersome to position the wagons (other than with horse or by manual methods) without propelling them through the shed, which would require barrier wagons or for the loco to enter and pass through the building. There's been some discussion on the forum in the past as to whether this sort of thing would have been allowed, but all I can say is that you do see very heavy smoke staining on some goods shed entrances, which suggests that engines certainly poked their noses in, if nothing else. In any case, I think this is a fair compromise for the sake of extra play value given that I've only got two sidings.

I haven't shown much of the right side of the module, beyond the shed, since it's tended to be a bit of a dumping ground for tools and modelling bits, but lately there's been a burst of progress. Here's the general idea of a road sweeping up and out of view, with several cottages lining the right hand side. The two at the top are scratchbuilt, while the timber framed one is the familiar Superquick model, but here given an additional layer of detailing with 3-d framing and a new roof. There's a smaller cottage planned to go to the right of this building, while the church (visible in the other shots) will also get the Superquick upgrade treatment. The shop in the foreground, meanwhile, is the Wills kit. This one suffered a bizarre gardening accident when I snipped a rail end using Xuron track cutters, only to have the offending rail shoot through the air and ram its way through the upper floor windows, neatly dislodging the glazing - which I now can't get back in to fix! The swine! I'll have to, of course, but it'll mean removing the rear wall which is a pain. Unfortunately there is a false floor between the upper and lower stories which is glued in well and proper. Why do the things we need to remove never come undone, and things we need to stay fixed on, keep coming apart?

Cheers, and thanks for reading.