Sunday, November 27, 2011

Flood Peak

In my last post I mentioned that we had never seen flood water come into our paddock.  Naively I thought that would be about as high as it would get so we went to bed happily and slept well.  


The next morning that water was up a bit more, but nothing too scary as yet. 
Then it kept getting higher... 

We played 'watch the gate post' and I took photos throughout the morning thinking each one would be the highest point.


I was wrong more than once...

It was at this point we decided that if the water reached the bottom of the retaining wall of the house we would shift everything we could upstairs and wait.


It got to within an inch of the retaining wall and stopped.  We started breathing again at this point.
The fence post in this last photo is a good reference for how high things got.  We had to move the round yard as there was over 2 foot of water flowing through that paddock and the water was already over the top of our gumboots as we pulled it down to move it.

It was such a strange feeling sitting here inside watching the water rise.  We were poised ready for action if needed and we felt calm, but mostly we just sat and watched.  As soon as the water started to go down I had to go to bed for a nap, I was emotionally exhausted, not that I knew it until that point


Today we can see the mess left behind.  There are fences flattened and debris in places I wish it wasn't, but we got off relatively well and as such I won't complain.....


.....but I will hope that this was our 100 year flood, and that we don't see worse to come, even if they are predicting more rain in a couple of days.


3 comments:

willywagtail said...

Wow! Scary even in it's beauty. Here's hoping your house is high enough for even the worst of the floods. We have had heaps of rain here too but as we are right on the coast the only thing that annoys us generally is that the grass keeps growing which must sound vvery unfair to a farmer. Cherrie

roseinthebush said...

One of the scary things with flood water is it does not wait for anyone or anything in its search for the sea. Its power and might is awesome. I am pleased you are all ok, and wish you well in the cleanup. The start of this wet season is making a BIG impression in a let of places so far, I hope it calms down a bit. Thanks for sharing.

Car said...

Scary stuff Becky, its amazing just how fast the water can come up and a great idea to photo document the rise.Glad to hear your house is safe :)