Mountain Widening 101

The valley after widening and before painting.

After making the bridge deck and staring at the gap it'll span I realized I should widen the valley floor so the bridge's vertical supports wouldn't be unnecessarily narrow, and so I'd have a better scene in this part of the layout. Also, it turned out that after studying some photos of the area the real circular bridge spanned some widening would make the area a little more prototypical. 

The circular bridge valley before widening and before removal of the foam deck.

Here's what this end of the layout looked like before widening and removal of the temporary foam board bridge deck to make way for the plastic model. 

Foam extensions were hot glued to the layout.

The valley extension was built up from foam scraps stuck together and to the layout with hot glue. I used the same construction methods as I did with the Quetzalcoatlus Corridor. 

Now, any micro-layout sticklers out there might be waving around the micro-layout rule book and asking if this is a micro-layout anymore? Ok, well, as you know the trefoil base that actually 'touches the ground' was designed to have an area of 4 square feet, the maximum for a micro, but as you also know I backed off a little on the equation for area so it had round numbers, so it under calculates area a little, meaning the trefoil is a bit under 4. Ok, but, does the extra 'air area' that the Q. Corridor and Valley Extension take up make the layout now exceed 4 square feet? I don't know .... and don't particularly care :-) Frankly, I like that these extensions just stick out. They add visual interest and improve the scenes in ways I hadn't thought of when I started the layout. I wouldn't want to not add what I think is goodness to the layout just to conform to some rule book. 

Strip this layout of its micro designation if you must, but not the fun :-)

A later stage of CelluClay application.

Once the foam was given a preliminary shape with the saw and rasp I began applying CelluClay to form the terrain. There were several rounds of CelluClay application to build up the shape I wanted. Given the long drying times and somewhat more humid air at this time of year this job took around a week or so to complete.

I haven't yet painted the valley extension. Instead I feel the need to make some vertical bridge supports and add their concrete bases to the valley floor. 

First though I need to rid my head of an earworm. All this work with fake rock for some unknown reason got me thinking again of this old song from my youth that I spent endless hours trying to figure out. Hmmm, life is a rock, but the CelluClay rolled me? Here, let me play it again.....