Harlech Station
Last year (2009) the ladies of Harlech WI adopted the railway station as we felt it was looking rather sad and uncared for and that it didn’t represent the image of Harlech we wanted for our visitors arriving by train.
Initially we just planned on brushing up and picking up litter and planting a few tubs to add some colour.
However this year we had this mad idea of painting the shelters, little did we realise just how much work was involved!
We enlisted the help of the local school and pupils from year 9 came along and stencilled some Welsh themed designs on the panels. The college helped us design and draw out the mural of Taliesin. We wanted to depict a story from the Mabinogion as many visitors and Welsh know nothing of the stories and as we have painted this on the side closest to the Castle our visitors arrive to see the mural and then see our magnificent Castle perched on the rock high above.
We have been helped along the way by the local fire brigade who came and jet washed the shelters for us saving us a lot of hard work cleaning. What a great bunch of lads they are.
We have just been given an old boat by the Barmouth harbour master which has been repaired by one of our ladies husbands. It is due to be placed at the far end of the one platform with in the next couple of weeks. We will then plant it up with bee loving plants as this is one of the campaigns adopted by the WI nationally.
We have recently had an unfortunate incident where a stolen scooter was set alight to in the one shelter which has damaged some of the panels but this hasn’t deterred us and as soon as arriva have carried out the repairs we will repaint it. It’s sad to see the hard work by the children ruined so soon.
We have other projects in hand but it all takes time and money.
We have had great fun and laughter despite the hard work and it’s something we would recommend to any group wanting to do something for the community.
We have also had such positive comments from Arriva passengers and the community alike.
The mural of Taliesin by the ladies of Harlech WI....and if you look closely you will see the slogan of the WI – “Jam and Jerusalem!”
More photos can be seen on our website www.harlechwi.co.uk