The orchard nobody planted

Forty pear trees on the edge of the Kestrel estate were left behind by a nursery that closed in 1987. Now the whole street picks them.

The pears on the Kestrel estate. Take what you can carry. AI-generated

Nobody on the Kestrel estate remembers who planted the pear trees, because nobody did. They were nursery stock, left in the ground when the Hollins nursery closed in 1987 and the land was forgotten.

The trees grew anyway. For years their fruit fell and rotted in the long grass. Then, four autumns ago, a retired teacher called Win Abbott put up a ladder and a hand-written sign: Take what you can carry.

This year the street picked more than a tonne.

Port Avery is an invented town. Its people, stories and places are made up to show this template working, and every picture, photographs and drawings alike, is AI-generated. Replace them all with your own.

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Also in this edition

Money

Your water bill, explained line by line

The new water bills arrived across Port Avery this week, and the phone lines at the utility’s office have been busy since. The total has risen by about nine percent for a typical household, but most of the rise sits in a single line. The standing charge, which every home pays whatever it uses, went up by a fifth. The utility says the money goes to replacing the Victorian mains under the old town, where a burst pipe flooded Wren Square last winter. Three numbers are worth checking: the meter reading, which is sometimes estimated; the number of people the bill assumes live in your home; and the sewerage line, which you can reduce if your roof water runs into your garden rather than the drain.

Continued on p. 4 →

The 22:10 crossing, the last of the day. AI-generated

Harbour

Council keeps the night ferry, for now

The last ferry of the day across the Merrow will keep running until at least next summer, after the council voted by twenty-two to twenty against cutting it. The crossing carries about ninety passengers a night, most of them hospital and hotel staff.

Continued on p. 2 →

Tram 11 in the depot. Volunteers say it will carry passengers again in the spring. AI-generated

Walks

A Sunday walk along the old tram line

The trams stopped running in Port Avery in 1961, but they never quite left. Their rails are still under the tarmac on Station Road, and in hot summers they show through. This walk follows them from the old depot to the sea front, past the cast-iron shelter at Fiveways and the bricked-up tram shed that is now a climbing wall. Allow two hours, and finish at the kiosk on the promenade, which has served tea since the trams were still running.

Continued on p. 2 →

Families

Half-term: twelve things to do that cost nothing

Half-term starts on Friday. Here are twelve things to do in Port Avery that cost nothing, tested by the Courier's own children, who were not asked. 1. Count the bubbles. The Merrow Field Station runs a free family morning at the lake on Saturday: nets, trays and a microscope that shows what lives in a drop of marsh water. 2. Ride the ferry and back. Under-twelves travel at no charge with an adult, and the view of the harbour from halfway across is the best in town. 3. The library's Monday matinee. A film, a carpet and no talking, at two. 4. The tram depot. The volunteers restoring Tram 11 let visitors watch on Wednesday afternoons, and will explain the brakes at length. 5. Rock pools at Gull Point, two hours either side of low tide. Put the rocks back the way you found them. The other seven, from the climbing wall's free taster hour to the bakery on Mill…

Continued on p. 9 →