Talk about the weather

Thanks to those who have asked about my family and I – we are still above water (although everything smells damp), but that’s more than can be said for a lot of Queensland. Huge areas of the state are flooded or cut off, and the rest is so wet that when it rains there is no-where for the water to go. The sky was so dark with clouds earlier today that it looked like evening and there was flash-flooding in Toowoomba, which is on top of the range.

There’s some footage of it here:

Edit 11 Jan 2010: Parts of the CBD were evacuated, so I am home early today. There was a rumour the trains would stop at 1pm. People are enjoying their first opportunity to panic shop. Brisbane river has burst its banks at West End. Roads are cut all over the place. Man on train said the important thing to worry about is whether you have cold beer to drink while sitting on the roof. And it is still raining.

My sister and I have decided rum+coke would be appropriate.

Edit 11 Jan 2011: They may start turning power off to suburbs soon. Our street is on the flood list, but all except one end is above 1974 flood levels. We do not have gas or candles because frankly, the thought of trying to cook with gas is unattractive and my sister and I have expressly agreed that we are prepared to live on cold pasta and flavoured tuna indefinitely. Also, pink velvet cupcakes (seriously – who has 6 tablespoons of red food colouring just lying around?). So if there aren’t any more updates, don’t worry – we just won’t have internet access. I’ll have my phone, but keeping the charge on it so may not call.

Edit 12 Jan 2011: 7.30am. Our street is cut off now, and water is rising at the bottom. Snakes are swimming by with their heads held out of the water. We have cupcakes, pasta and flavoured tuna and are preparing for the seige. Also, my sister filled every receptacle in the kitchen with water (except the kettle). We can get out on foot, and it isn’t pretty. Houses on neighbouring streets are flooded, the big furniture business down the road is half-submerged, with shipping containers floating in the carpark. The Ipswich Motorway is awash as far as we can see from the top of the roundabout towards the city. We still have power, but don’t know for how much longer. And no, we’re not going into work today.

Five Beautiful Places: or, what I’ve been doing with my weekends.

1. Mt Tambourine. Deb and I walked the Witches Falls Circuit through the vertical rainforest and hung over the lookout platform, staring at the great hexagonal columns gradually detaching themselves from the mountain, and at the slight waterfall which fell and fell and never seemed to stop falling, and the endless trees. We saw hollow trunks and massive whorled cavernous shells of trees, and on the way back lyrebirds crossed our path. I’ve never been bushwalking in a skirt before, but it did make me feel very Isabella Bird, and was quite comfortable and airy.
2. Mt Kosciuszko. Very high, very clear, very beautiful. On the mountain, everything is grey-green and pure and cold and fantastical rock formations and clear pools shape and reflect the sky. From the skilift, while the other subeditor’s brother threatened to rock it, the world was distant and perfect and the grass far below was blonde and soft and restless. I hadn’t planned this trip and was only warned a week out that I would be going with my sister to “the highest mountain on the lowest and flattest continent”. I want to go back and be quiet somewhere up near the summit and keep trying to capture the peculiar blue of the hills and clarity of the air. Coincidentally, it was where my parents had spent their honeymoon on the same weekend 29 years before.
3. Mt Coot-tha. We had our Good Friday breakfast in a new location – orange juice, barbequed bacon and eggs, hot cross buns crunchy from being toasted in the oils on the barbeque, pancakes with lemon and sugar, or with chocolate eggs wrapped in them and melted. While the various fires were being lit, a few of us ran up the hill which was green and lawn-like and sparkling, and spelled Emily! with our shadows near the top (because there were six of us and she had the shortest name).
4. Hatton Vale. We have horses in the back half of my parents’ yard now, and a labyrinth of butterfly-leaved bushes at the front. I sat out on a blanket with a shady hat and drew both and ate dark Lindt chocolate.
5. The road to Dalby. I went out for Aimee’s birthday – halfway to what used to be home. I hadn’t forgotten how beautiful the country on that side of the range was, but it has been too long since I’ve seen it. Out past Oakey and the upturned bowl of Gowrie Mountain, the world levels out. The sky is a great blue dish, plumed on one side, and the world is so flat it seems tiny under that immense sky. The highway straightens and becomes blue, the trees and powerlines march away, the grass is tawny and the sorghum russet-red and when the sun sets the world turns gold and candy-pink and scarlet. It is so soon like home, and there is a claustrophobic feeling attendant on returning through Toowoomba and sinking down the range into the little, gnarly, pocketed, miniature landscapes of the valley, which are dim and beautiful and every changing like a little world in a fairy tale. But not so vacantly majestic, nor so nearly home.