Paddington Basin

Spending 5 nights moored at Little Venice gave me a chance to explore Paddington Basin, though not before taking the opportunity to move the boat a few yards closer to the Toll House when the chance arose.
The original mooring on one ring and with two stakes driven into the soft ground for the rear mooring rope was not ideal as the boat was at a slight angle to the bank and kept banging the wall all night long in the strong wind. The bank is so low (about 2 inches above the water line) that fenders seemed to do little. On the subject of the low bank, a Bantam Tug passed, having approached at such a speed that the wake was overflowing the bank and the waves continued for some minutes afterwards. Anyway, back to Paddington! Having never had the opportunity to explore the arm previously I was amazed with the ease of access to the Hammersmith and City Underground Station at the country end of the main line station and spotted a useful Sainsbury Local in the new development known as Paddington Central.
The rebuilding of Bishops Road bridge is well underway and the construction workers were busy erecting scaffolding (the subject of a stoppage notice that I had received by the new Waterscape email service). It seemd though that a channel was being made available for boats to access the basin and this was the subject of a later email from Waterscape confirming this. There is plenty of mooring available in the basin and in the arm itself. Pontoons have been laid out, but with no mooring rings. I suspect these are intended for the so called business barges.
There were many security guards in evidence, though I doubt they are for the waterside. I expect they will disappear when the buildings are fully occupied. (See Photo Album for more pictures)