Don't make a mountain out of a molehill make a garden out of it.
The Squamish Rotary Club did just that this month when it took a "mound of dirt" overlooking the West Coast Railway Heritage Park (WCRHP) and turned it into a beautiful, relaxing garden with a variety of plants and flowers and some benches for people to relax.
"It's beautiful, it's really, really beautiful," said WCRHP general manager Dave Thomson. "It takes the whole park up a notch."
According to Brian Finley, Rotary director of community service, the garden project at the Railway Park began two years ago when park executives approached Rotary asking whether the club would be interested in building a garden.
The idea was to use the highest point in the park, the berm, which until a month ago was "just this mound of dirt."
Finley said there was no money available at the time, so this year Rotary put some money aside and teamed up with community volunteers to make the project happen.
"I think it's quite a bit different than what we first envisioned, but it's one of these things that changes as you go along," he said. "And in the end it's a nice, quiet, appealing area and in a couple of years when the planting's grown up, it will look really nice."
Rotarian Rose Fast is an avid gardener and she assumed the role of head gardener and garden designer immediately.
"I love gardening," said Fast. "So I said, 'I will do the garden design and boss around the equipment operator.'"
She said the amount of donated time, effort and materials was phenomenal.
"Carney's donated the soil, Coast Aggregates donated gravel, Cardinal Concrete donated equipment operator time, Blake Hopkins donated his truck to go pick up soil and dump it and truck operator Doug Barrone donated a day of his time," she said.
The garden is located just past the caboose in the Railway Park. There are gravel paths that meander upward, a dry creekbed with alpine plants, three areas to sit and dozens of plants and flowers to enjoy.
"Now that the Railway Park has this real awesome park, it's a real enhancement because some people like to sit and just look at the trains, and have a picnic lunch or something," said Fast.
"We put in things like rhododendrons, day lilies, roses, junipers, grass and groundcovers - they had to be deer-proof and drought tolerant."
Fast said volunteers made sure not to plant anything that would hide the view once it reaches its full height and they also planted several flowers that would come back year after year, such as brown-eyed Susans (rudbeckia).
The garden was a gift to the Railway Park and will be maintained by park staff in the future, although Rotary promised to pitch in the first season for the maintenance.
For Fast, that isn't much of a chore.
"You do what you love to do - on the day we planted it was so wet and miserable but we had an awesome time!" she said.
Fast said the garden is a perfect example of what Rotary is all about.
"Rotary does a whole mixture of projects," she said. "We often give money to things that fall between the cracks.
"We're just people in the community who like to make our community a better place - and this is something in the community we can all enjoy and take pride in."
