News from the village of Ardentinny, Argyll, Scotland.
With garden art afloat and ‘Elfin Cottage’ under a foot of water, parts of Glenfinart Walled Garden remain flooded from the River Finart overflow on Saturday.
The waters rose sufficiently to penetrate the office floor, however there does not appear to be any damage to the main infrastructure of the garden. Parts of the area are still under around 18 inches of water, so it will take several days to drain off and for the clear-up to begin.
Rather than swan lake it was a case of swan wood with swans navigating their way across Coronation Wood today as Loch Long rose to its highest level for several years.
The beach area, from the hotel to Shepherds Point, was well under check out this site water at high tide with the slipway totally submerged and the waves lapping around beached boats. The beach path from the church, which was recently repaired by Scottish Water, was washed away and is impassible for vehicles. Coronation Wood was under about a foot of water.
Further along at Shepherds Point, the car park is strewn with seaweed, illustrating the force of the water. The River Finart also burst its banks near the bridge and the bowling green is under water! Glenfinart Walled Garden didn’t escape the force of the weather and suffered significant flooding.
Next high tide is 02.07hrs.
faptitansThanks to Jim Robinson for additional photographs and video.
Video courtesy Jim Robinson
[Click image to enlarge]
Invalid Displayed Gallery
Sunday night’s high winds brought an iconic Ardentinny landmark crashing to the ground in the garden of Ardentinny Hotel. The 80-foot conifer fortunately fell towards the beach, leaving the recently part-renovated hotel undamaged.
On Saturday 9 November, unbeknown to Ardentinny Community Trust, Glenfinart Walled Garden won Gold in the Community Partnership’s Initiative of the Year Award ‘for the work of volunteers in transforming a walled garden that had been more or less abandoned in the 1920’s into something the local community can treasure’
The Community Partnership is a charitable membership organisation run by its members for the benefit of communities within the National Park. It runs a programme of events, including its Annual Gathering, at which its annual awards were presented last Saturday.
Another Ardentinny resident was also an award recipient. Eileen Connell received silver in the over 25 Volunteer category ‘for her work on the Ardentinny memorial Wood (Coronation Wood)’ which is the wooded area opposite Ardentinny car park which belongs to Gauld Estates Ltd. Mr. Gauld apparently granted permission to a group of enthusiastic volunteers to clear and restore the area for the benefit of the community. 
And there’s more. The Walled Garden has been shortlisted for the 2013 UK National Park Volunteer Awards in the Projects category. This will be judged at the end of the month. So, fingers crossed, Glenfinart Walled Garden will do it again!
With Ardentinny temperatures reaching some 26C, a forest fire was narrowly avoided above Sandy Beach yesterday thanks to the quick action of Strathclyde Fire and Rescue.
The alarm was raised by a local resident who alerted emergency services just after 3pm. Two fire appliances from Dunoon were on the scene within 20 minutes and extinguished the blaze which mainly affected scrub in the forest above the beach. The fire tenders remained at the scene for several hours dousing the blackened terrain.
We understand that the water supply to the beach toilets and bowling club was also cut. The beach picnic area was packed at the time with many families camped out over the weekend. On Sunday afternoon a fire service appliance returned to the scene and firefighters again doused the area (see video below).
Visitors are reminded to take special care throughout the hot weather and to ensure that barbecues and cigarettes are extinguished properly and glass bottles are disposed of carefully.
