SPRING !

Enjoy the peach blossom all buzzin' with bees.
Symbols of hope & renewal.

The first signs of spring. Our winter of 4-6 weeks is almost over. Hasn't rained since June 26th, the creek is down to last trickle & some neighbors have run out of water. Bushfires all around, mostly arson, or idiots whose pre-fireban period burnoffs got out of control. Why anyone would light fires when the countryside is tinder dry beats me. At least a recent slight change blew the smoke pall away, enough to give a blue sky in above shot. But today the air is a jaundiced yellow/khaki again.

Thinking of the whales surging along the coast on annual summer migration, just started. I can almost feel the whoosh and surge as they surface, breath & dive again.

Meanwhile Wollumbin's Fighting Chief of the North is a sleeping giant enveloped in a pall of smoke.

Dream On.

What we are breathing

Today I went out, took this shot above - I live in that pall of smoke. It's been 4-5 days of it.
Compare it with the shot of same view below, taken just 3 months ago.


This is all because some bloke thought he'd burn off & beat the official August 1st Fire Ban start, no thought apparently for the drought conditions, exacerbated by the sudden black frost last week. Coldest night for some 30 years.

Today it was 29 degrees C. Spring has started. If the winds start up we have big big problems.