The Wet - I

Normally a nice view of Five Mile Creek in Woodend, from this bench. Still a pastoral scene, but somewhat more aquatic.

It's been interesting times around Eastern Australia recently, as most know. The tragic events up in Queensland, including the shocking fatal flash flooding in Toowoomba, have hit the world's headlines, and recently, and currently, there's been significant flooding in North-Western Victoria, with towns flooded and in some cases isolated, but with thankfully none of the sudden onrush and subsequent loss of life Queenslanders have faced. Many people have asked us if we are OK, (including Sahlah in a recent comment) and we are.

In fact the longer it stays wetish (for us) the better as stuff can grow, and it eats into what's normally fire season. We'd all like it in less big lumps, more evenly spread over time. But we certainly aren't going to complain, here.

There's been exceptional rainfall around us and some minor flooding, which has thankfully been mainly 'interesting' rather than a problem for our area of Victoria. Here's some of what we've seen.

The view of the rock, shows a local field filling from the lower side. The low line of trees running down to the right are on a creek, normally dry, but here... On that day we measured 102mm (4 in) of rain, which was frankly like being in the tropics, for us.

A later walk a day or two later with as much rain again, this was a nearby field. I liked capturing a cloud in the puddle. Kind of existential waterness.


This is (rather obviously) the Campaspe River in flood. The turbulent line is the river, the rest is meadow, underwater. It's a fair amount of water, and in fact this is the stuff providing part of the problem for our north-western neighbours, because the Campaspe flows inland and (much later) into the Murray, this causing Echuca and the other towns to the north of us and downstream on the Murray (westwards) lots of problems. Like a lot of Australia's rivers, it's not very big, it's very long, and it goes the wrong way. And like many of them, it's there as much as a flood route - very infrequently - as a normal river.

'No Entry' indeed. This is the car park for Woodend's tourist information centre. It's actually only a few centimetres deep, and drained quite soon. In fact before we got there, our friend Kathy captured a shot in Woodend that was waterless when we arrived a few hours later. It's a great shot, and you can see it here.

ALL of the waters above have now gone, and while it's a bit damp (like England is all the time) it's not a problem anymore.

But more on the Big Wet soon...

James