I'm in Gloucestershire, so not too far away. That's the thing with gardening, not just veg growing, it's all a learning curve, get as much info as you can and don't get disheartened when it goes wrong. It's great when it goes right and you're eating your own home grown veg with no air miles !
I bought the Readers Digest guide 'Food From Your Garden' years ago and it soon became my fruit & veg bible. It has everything from planning a plot, through growing guides for just about everything, to pests & diseases and even recipes (you haven't lived until you've eaten potato & cucumber pie!). Not sure if it's still in print but you might find a used version on Amazon or Abe's Books.
By the way, looking at your plot photo, I'd recommend raising the wall around the plot and filling it up to the top with good compost and a green manure such as grazing rye of winter vetch (you leave it be over winter, then chop it up and dig it in when Spring comes). If it used to be a rockery, the soil will need a fair amount of TLC to bring it up to food-growing standard - it will be too thin on nutrients to sow crops straight away.
Emma, watering is key in a garden, most new plants have to be nursed in, this means checking them every day or two and make sure they don't sag or look unhappy.
It's good to have an outside tap and use a hose if you can because watering by watering can can mean a lot of trips, the ground has to be really wet. Many first timers think that if the soil looks wet that is enough, but if you put your finger in the soil it can just be the surface layer that is wet. Feeding the soil is also key, although you should get good crops the first year, soil can become tired. Remedy this with some compost if you can, or you could just sprinkle some growmore in the soil. Do this with flower beds too. If you have good soil and water well, almost everything thrives and grows well.
As you can see from my title I'm in the London suburbs, close enough to Heathrow to have weather systems of my own sometimes.
If you have limited space I would suggest going vertical with any root veg in between, beans are good, peas, a tomato or two as cordons. I love pickled gherkins so grow Cornichon with purple sprouting broccoli in the gaps. As I said before you should grow what you like not just what's easy, it's more satisfying
"The trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will insist on coming along and trying to put things in it." Sir Terry Pratchett
You won't be able to grow blueberries in the ground in Bath. Cotswold limestone - death to a blueberry and the water is very hard too. You can grow a blueberry bush in a nice big pot with the right compost ('ericaceous') if you can collect rainwater to water it with. I wouldn't grow 'normal' raspberries there either as they spread like mad and you don't have room. You can get a clump forming raspberry called 'Ruby Beauty' which might be OK. Or you could keep your plot for veg and grow fruit in a pot garden, with a blueberry, raspberry, dwarf apple trees, strawberries in hanging baskets - that sort of thing.
Veg generally like limey soil though - so those will be much simpler than fruit
Gardening on the edge of Exmoor, in Devon
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
I should have said, as we were renting before we bought our house, we have quite a few fruit things in pots. Strawberries, blueberries, raspberries & apricots. The blueberries were in ericaceous compost this year (and were the only thing that didn't fruit!), but I'm pretty sure it was the sun that did for them. We already have a water butt that collects rain water that is right next to the veggie patch, so I think that will be fine too. I will try some green compost over winter - I kinda knew that we had to do something over winter, but didn't really know what was best! Thanks for all your helpful suggestions!
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It's good to have an outside tap and use a hose if you can because watering by watering can can mean a lot of trips, the ground has to be really wet. Many first timers think that if the soil looks wet that is enough, but if you put your finger in the soil it can just be the surface layer that is wet.
Feeding the soil is also key, although you should get good crops the first year, soil can become tired. Remedy this with some compost if you can, or you could just sprinkle some growmore in the soil. Do this with flower beds too.
If you have good soil and water well, almost everything thrives and grows well.
If you have limited space I would suggest going vertical with any root veg in between, beans are good, peas, a tomato or two as cordons. I love pickled gherkins so grow Cornichon with purple sprouting broccoli in the gaps. As I said before you should grow what you like not just what's easy, it's more satisfying
Veg generally like limey soil though - so those will be much simpler than fruit
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”