This week  has seen a wee bit of progress on the new scenic extension to the layout. Recapping from July, I showed how I'd decided to push the scenery onto one of the previously non-scenic connecting bits, by reworking the end of the summer module:

Into this revised format, where the sky board is now "unwrapped" so that it continues out over the former connecting bit.

I've now begun landscaping the new bit:

The gist of it is a cutting, with land held back by retaining walls on either side, and with the level gradually lowering down to the track as it progresses out over the board. It's really just an excuse to find space for a few cottages that have been gathering dust for far too long, and you'll quickly spot the Superquick and Readt-to-plonk factor here! The thatched cottage is a Hornby one which has been lightly repainted, while the remaining trio - not yet in fixed positions - have great sentimental value. Two of them were made by my wife about 25 years

ago, while the oldest one is the work of my mother, and must be much nearer 50 years old than 40. I make no apologies for finding space for these old buildings, and besides, it's not as if layouts tend to be dominated by Superquick kits in the way that they were a few decades ago. Now it's more likely to be a row of Metcalf cottages!

Quite a bit of rough-and-ready modelling has been necessary to rework the roadway across the bridge, with much use of Wilko's fine surface filler - surely the greatest modelling product in history? I go through buckets of the stuff, and it occasionally gets used for its intended purpose around the house, too!

The reinforced retaining wall was inspired by one in Mountain Ash which I've always thought was very modellogenic, although it took me a while to remember where I'd seen it, until I was driving back through "Mount" yesterday. There's a single-lane road in front of the cottages; I don't really envisage it as a through-road, but just a lane which will eventually peter out into some allotments at the lower end of the cutting. 

And that's where it is for now. I don't know about other modellers, but once I've got things to this basic landform stage, I can sort of fill-in the eventual result with my mind's eye, so it already makes a pleasing backdrop for trains.

Onward...