I'm very sorry you chose to visit our garden while it was closed. The signs are clear wooden signs both of which have said Closed for at least 6 weeks. The sign at the top of the hill is designed to let people know we are closed before driving down to our garden. I do not understand your reference to a book on our sign as a book up there wouldn't last five minutes in our windy hills. Our website says we are open by appointment as we try to make sure it is a suitable time to visit our private garden and to make sure the weather and road conditions are favourable. Usually we say to people to not visit in Winter as there can be snow on the road and while the native garden is interesting year round the perennial plantings are at their seasonal worst. It is true that phoning first is best as we ask on our website. We cannot be responsible for weather differences between here and Akaroa as they do differ sometimes to our advantage sometimes to Akaroa. I don't see how we can change our signs as they are wooden to fit in with other local signs and clearly say we are either open or closed. It is upsetting to be judged at a time when we were clearly closed.