Emma came to help us with the flight yesterday and parked in the BW car park at Bottom Lock, as she has done before.
She drove in through this gate and parked ahead and then walked up to the top lock to meet us. She did not have to go back through the gate. If she had she would have seen 5/6 notices all saying that the gate would be locked between 4pm and 9am.
One cannot deny that BW have tried very hard to let people know the situation and maybe she should have gone back and read them but she just didn't notice. The first we knew was when we went across in the evening, having decided to drive to the All You Can Eat Chinese Buffet in Leamington..... luckily when shopping earlier we had purchase a couple of dine in for 2 meals from Tesco's!!!!
The worst bit was that Emma had planned to leave at 7 as she had patients to see. Needless to say she was very upset. As it turned out when Geoff checked at 8 there were a couple of BW vehicles there so she was able to leave then. On cannot deny that there are plenty of notices but the sighting of them is suspect so I rang BW at Hatton and had a chat(an amicable one). I suggested that since other boats had visitors who came to help with the flight and presumably leave cars parked there, that a notice actually on the lock gates at the top and bottom of the flight would be a good idea. The lady called Jill I spoke to promised to pass it on...we shall see.
We have had two sets of visitors today, Mike Peaker and Iain & Christine Gillespie. They all parked in the same place and when they reached Petroc we asked them what time the car park shut....none of them had any idea. Like Emma they parked and went straight ahead and had no reason to look back to where the notices were. They all departed just before 4!!!
Prior to that we had a lovely day catching up with every one's news. We walked up to the Waterman pub at the top of the flight and had a very good lunch. The weather was kind and it was hotter than it has been for sometime.
Centre section of the flight.......looks forbidding when viewed from below
Pause for rest part way up
Ornamental Dragonfly in one of the upper side pounds
On the return walk we passed two sets of boats roped together passing
Our mooring below bottom lock
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