We were in Chelsea yesterday, visiting ![[profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
fire_wuff's family for Xmas lunch. It was horrendously humid, although the Bureau of Meteorology was vaguely promising a thunderstorm for the evening. That was something to look forward to, I thought.
Yes, well.
As we left, it was just starting to rain. We thought we'd timed it pretty well - the rain had probably moved on from home and we'd have a good run. I pause for howls of derision in the light of hindsight.
Driving back along Eastlink, we got some fairly spectacular views of the two stormfronts that ... wait. Two?? Yep - one north-east, one west of us. We were in a weird little corridor of relatively clear sky between lightning on one side and a rain band that looked like an actual wall on the other. Still, running the gauntlet didn't seem like such a bad idea. And the scenery was fascinating.
But of course, roads wind, don't they? And suddenly we were no longer driving parallel to the storms, but right into one of them. At which point our scenic trip home turned into ... an adventure.
There was thunder cracking right overhead. There were lightning strikes everywhere, sometimes hitting simultaneously from all around us. And there was rain. Ye gods, was there rain.
Traffic on the freeway slowed to a crawl, but - Melbourne drivers being psychotically devoid of either awareness of others or a sense of self-preservation - it wasn't because visibility was reduced to approximately two inches beyond the windscreen. Oh, no. People were as impatient and dangerous as ever in that respect. No, it was the flash flood on the Eastern Freeway just past Doncaster Road. Aha, we thought, we'll just pop out onto Manningham Road. Cunning, no?
Except Manningham Road was also flooded.
So we eventually took a detour through Balwyn and Bulleen before inevitably meeting up with the traffic snarl in Heidelberg, and inched home. Meanwhile the skies merrily went about lending an air of apocalypse to the afternoon's festivities. There was some truly bedraggled tinsel hanging off the streetlights in Burgundy Street, I can tell you. But, hey, not to worry, the rain was slacking off. We'd come out the other side of the storm front.
You'd think we'd know better. The universe is perverse, and never more so than we hapless mortals like us figure we've got it all worked out.
We turned a corner - and ran into what I can only describe as a wall of rain. The downpour made the earlier storm look like a light sunshower by comparison. The wipers at full speed did little more than slosh around the water smashing into it and cascading off the roof. Then the hail started, and it seemed pretty much inevitable that we were about to lose our windscreen. The drains overflowed, and it seemed like only seconds before the dips in the road started flooding. Again with the thunder and lightning, adding to the incredible din of the hail and rain hitting the car. We started aqua-planing around corners. Right about then I became fast friends with the 'jesus handle' above the passenger door, and hung on for dear life.
Wuff, of course, was laughing like a maniac. And so were Lilygirl and Meglet.
We weren't driving fast, but with everything happening, it felt like we were hurtling through Reservoir, crashing through puddles up to nearly a metre deep and barely keeping our tyres on the road. All to the music of Lady Gaga.
Eventually we got home, and the rain slackened - to be greeted by possibly the most bedraggled, pathetic cat in existence. She was mightily miffed at us, and only just consented to let me towel her dry. Lilygirl and Meglet, of course, decided that it was exactly the right time to change into their swimmers and go puddle-jumping.
Which, I'm sure, was fun. And apparently was even more fun when the heavens opened again a few minutes later.
Wuff was apparently unable to resist the siren song of an utter drenching and raced out to join them.
Me? I stayed inside.
But we made it home safely, and the worst damage we sustained was when a rusted drain pipe fell off the garage wall and shattered. Oh, and the disgruntled sensibilities of our cat. We got lucky, apparently - there were plenty of pictures of broken windscreens and holed verandah canopies this morning, as well as the odd submerged taxi. It was a hell of an adrenaline ride, but we survived.
... And, being a glutton for punishment, Wuff decided to walk to the shop today and took a detour via Merri Creek. From this picture of the debris line, it looks like the creek levels got to over a metre above the path.
And on its way through, the water took out at least one tree:
Which was all very interesting, but I could have done without Wuff - who got soaked again in the relatively light rain - sharing the experience by rubbing his wet head all over me.
He's thoughtful, that way.
Meglet is convinced that this was the best Christmas ever. What worries me is that she'll now expect us to top this next year.
I'm not sure the planet would survive.
fire_wuff's family for Xmas lunch. It was horrendously humid, although the Bureau of Meteorology was vaguely promising a thunderstorm for the evening. That was something to look forward to, I thought.Yes, well.
As we left, it was just starting to rain. We thought we'd timed it pretty well - the rain had probably moved on from home and we'd have a good run. I pause for howls of derision in the light of hindsight.
Driving back along Eastlink, we got some fairly spectacular views of the two stormfronts that ... wait. Two?? Yep - one north-east, one west of us. We were in a weird little corridor of relatively clear sky between lightning on one side and a rain band that looked like an actual wall on the other. Still, running the gauntlet didn't seem like such a bad idea. And the scenery was fascinating.
But of course, roads wind, don't they? And suddenly we were no longer driving parallel to the storms, but right into one of them. At which point our scenic trip home turned into ... an adventure.
There was thunder cracking right overhead. There were lightning strikes everywhere, sometimes hitting simultaneously from all around us. And there was rain. Ye gods, was there rain.
Traffic on the freeway slowed to a crawl, but - Melbourne drivers being psychotically devoid of either awareness of others or a sense of self-preservation - it wasn't because visibility was reduced to approximately two inches beyond the windscreen. Oh, no. People were as impatient and dangerous as ever in that respect. No, it was the flash flood on the Eastern Freeway just past Doncaster Road. Aha, we thought, we'll just pop out onto Manningham Road. Cunning, no?
Except Manningham Road was also flooded.
So we eventually took a detour through Balwyn and Bulleen before inevitably meeting up with the traffic snarl in Heidelberg, and inched home. Meanwhile the skies merrily went about lending an air of apocalypse to the afternoon's festivities. There was some truly bedraggled tinsel hanging off the streetlights in Burgundy Street, I can tell you. But, hey, not to worry, the rain was slacking off. We'd come out the other side of the storm front.
You'd think we'd know better. The universe is perverse, and never more so than we hapless mortals like us figure we've got it all worked out.
We turned a corner - and ran into what I can only describe as a wall of rain. The downpour made the earlier storm look like a light sunshower by comparison. The wipers at full speed did little more than slosh around the water smashing into it and cascading off the roof. Then the hail started, and it seemed pretty much inevitable that we were about to lose our windscreen. The drains overflowed, and it seemed like only seconds before the dips in the road started flooding. Again with the thunder and lightning, adding to the incredible din of the hail and rain hitting the car. We started aqua-planing around corners. Right about then I became fast friends with the 'jesus handle' above the passenger door, and hung on for dear life.
Wuff, of course, was laughing like a maniac. And so were Lilygirl and Meglet.
We weren't driving fast, but with everything happening, it felt like we were hurtling through Reservoir, crashing through puddles up to nearly a metre deep and barely keeping our tyres on the road. All to the music of Lady Gaga.
Eventually we got home, and the rain slackened - to be greeted by possibly the most bedraggled, pathetic cat in existence. She was mightily miffed at us, and only just consented to let me towel her dry. Lilygirl and Meglet, of course, decided that it was exactly the right time to change into their swimmers and go puddle-jumping.
Which, I'm sure, was fun. And apparently was even more fun when the heavens opened again a few minutes later.
Wuff was apparently unable to resist the siren song of an utter drenching and raced out to join them.
Me? I stayed inside.
But we made it home safely, and the worst damage we sustained was when a rusted drain pipe fell off the garage wall and shattered. Oh, and the disgruntled sensibilities of our cat. We got lucky, apparently - there were plenty of pictures of broken windscreens and holed verandah canopies this morning, as well as the odd submerged taxi. It was a hell of an adrenaline ride, but we survived.
... And, being a glutton for punishment, Wuff decided to walk to the shop today and took a detour via Merri Creek. From this picture of the debris line, it looks like the creek levels got to over a metre above the path.
And on its way through, the water took out at least one tree:
Which was all very interesting, but I could have done without Wuff - who got soaked again in the relatively light rain - sharing the experience by rubbing his wet head all over me.
He's thoughtful, that way.
Meglet is convinced that this was the best Christmas ever. What worries me is that she'll now expect us to top this next year.
I'm not sure the planet would survive.
