A winter's day's visit to Testwood Lakes

We've had a bit of a lull over the winter.  Once the shell was completed and the cold, wet and dark set in, focus shifted for a while from building to funding.  As mentioned on our sister website, we've recently had another injection of cash from The Barker Mill Estate, as well as donations of internal materials and some good ideas and offers for progressing the internal work.

In the last week, workers have been back on site to start clearing the external ground and lowering the level where it is too high against the building, adjusting where we need fencing, and progressing the internals of the ground floor to get us to the point where we can start getting some volunteers involved to take the next steps.

Today was a lovely bright winter's day, so I took the family and the dog for a visit to Testwood Lakes, to get a view of how the building is settling into the landscape and to see how things are looking.  These photos are a record of our visit.

Murals on the gates to welcome visitors

Going into the site - Aquativity is at the bottom of the drive

Aquativity Centre from near the car park - note the reduced fencing

Looking back as we head off around the lake

The view back across the frozen water

Aquativity gets a little lost across the lake with the industrial estate and football club behind it

The Wildlife Education Centre nestles into the hill

Walking with the family back towards Aquativity

The ground near the front door is being lowered

...and piled up ready for removal

The fencing has been moved back to next to the building now that the main lake-side external work is complete

The boat store is ready to be insulated and plaster boarded

The main doors for maneuvering boats in and out

Looking across the boat store from the tent store

A good view from the tent store over the frozen lake

We can't get upstairs but we can look up into the framework

...from both ends of the building

Camera held up to look across the 1st floor

The sun streams into the main hall upstairs

Insulation going down on the ground floor

Screeding over the insulation by the front door

More external ground levelling this coming week, as well as finishing the ground floor insulation and screed, then plaster boarding in the boat store - looking forward to starting to get the boat racking in so we can use the boat store in the near future.  Then we need to get going with internal walls, electrics, plumbing etc. for changing rooms, showers and toilets...  Still plenty to do but great to see some progress again.