Garden Railway Forum

Too late for this month's bulletin, but happy to announce the launch of a new 16mm Special Interest Group. As a long time naturist, I was pleased to discover a number of keen garden railwayers amoung the community, a few informal chats over the last year and we decided to form a SIG for the association, the request has been made to the Board and we hope to have the group fully endorsed by the following bulletin, so far we have 5 commited members with 32 and 45mm lines, which has lead to our group slogan "large or small we welcome all"!

Luckily one of the group has a line in a secluded garden for our inaugural meeting, sadly the weather this year has not been kind so we've been had to postpone, hopefully as the clocks spring forward we should be able to hold the inauguration and have some suitable pictures for the Bulletin launch.

It is hoped we can find other suitable secluded locations for private meetings, already informal discussions are in place with Llechfan the location being ideally both secluded and shaded offering protection from the strong summer sun.

So what will a group meet entail? Well the same as any normal get together, for the moment we're going to enforce no pets or under 18s, aside from the clothing (or lack of it), now whilst the freedom of being skyclad in the great out doors is a fantastic liberating experience, there have to be some common sense consessions, and we have decided that when preparing, and running locos, gloves and aprons are a sensible safety measure to avoid the obvious risk of burns or singed hair.

As well as your usual paraphernalia, we advise factor 50 suncream, inspect repellent and a large beach towel, both for hygiene purposes when using your hosts garden furniture and for modesty should you find yourself with more than steam rising. Photos are allowed but only with permission and with suitable consideration to the modesty of all members.

We feel the group is going to present a new unique free way of sharing the hobby with others, the apron rule should also allow those new to the naturist movement to attend without the initial embarrassment of commiting to being fully exposed amoung strangers, hopefully the shared interests will soon overcome any self consciousness or embarresment.

We hope to help increase expose of the group to attend the 2025 AGM, and hopefully other shows, where there is the facility for a private side room, with our own layout so you'll be able to see our members in person.