Mushrooms at Gib Barracks

This time of the year always reminds me of Gibraltar Barracks, mainly due to the amount of fungi specimens that come out around this time. There were many things that I disliked about Gibraltar Barracks but the mushrooms weren’t one of them.

Gibraltar Barracks, Camberley, in my day was used to train Royal Engineers in the art of Combat Engineering. This was a 12 week intensive course that involved learning all about building bridges (the physical ones, not emotional ones! It was designed to erase the emotional ones!!), laying mines, mine clearing, road building, booby traps and loads more stuff. Mixed in with all this was lots of running, sometimes carrying telegraph poles (or men that weren’t pulling their weight!), being fire hosed down naked (well I say naked, we were encouraged to wear mess tins strapped together with bungees, which inevitably came off as they were hit with the powerful jets of water) (I’m actually wondering now if any of the troop NCO’s were from the Savile, Glitter, Hall club!) and being hit with golf clubs. What’s not to love about the experience I hear you ask? Well like I said, the mushrooms were spectacular. I saw my first Amanita Muscaria during this time, that big red mushroom with white spots.

I remember one time after a particularly physical and mentally demanding day we were made to stand in rank for more than an hour. We had being running for 3 hours occasionally stopping to enjoy press ups, sprinting and lying on your back lifting your legs 6 inches off the ground. Anyone who failed to satisfy the requirements of the directing staff was hit with a golf club. The good thing about being in a disciplined rank is that no one looks at each other. We were all wet and covered from head to toe in mud. Some of us were also decorated with blood but as we stood there in total silence we could hear a radio. I can’t remember anything other than ‘Martha’s Harbour’ by ‘All About Eve’ being played and it made me weep. I wasn’t blubbering, I’m not a total pansy! But I was concerned that the tears may wash away the engrained mud to reveal white tributaries on my face and hence give some indication that I was weak. Luckily the mud was too thick to be even washed away with a fire hose, never mind tears.

However, today we were out with Piggy again on another autumnal walk, he riding his bike, and we saw mushrooms and deer. It was another Thomas weekend on the railway, as it seems to be every other fuckin weekend now, so we watched as a train with a face on it went by. Darwin loved it.

"Darwin & Bun"

"Train with a Face"

"Darwin waiting for the Train"

"The Deer"