River rises

Those of you who have been following the 'weather' discussions on this and other blogs will be aware that in my area we have had 178mm (7") of rain in 5 days. I feel for those who are currently experiencing very cold, icy and even heavy snow conditions but, believe me, this much rain at the start of our southern summer time just is a nuisance.

The cherry crop has been destroyed at Young, with fruit swelling and bursting from excess water take-up before it could be picked. Soft vegetable crops, such as lettuce, have been destroyed and supermarkets are currently flying in such crops from either South America or South Africa - those crops can take up to 10 days before they hit the shelves so, a few days after you buy them they are 'crap' - wilted mush!

Farmers who were expecting a bumper wheat crop have had their hopes dashed as this heavy rain just flattens their crop, making it useless and unable to be harvested.

All of this is going to have a flow-on effect and prices are already escalating. People are leaving many "fresh" vegetables and fruits on the shelves and looking to packaged frozen alternatives in the refrigerator and freezer sections - and, of course - the prices for those items has inexplicably increased!

Anyhow, back to our local situation, this is an image of our usually placid Yass River at Riverbank Park.

Just before the old iron railway bridge in the background is a concrete weir and footpath where one can cross the river.

Now, this is the river today - I took quite a number of shots but will only put a a selected few:

Remember I said their was a weir and footpath - its under all of this water. Those small trees on either side are where the bank normally is!

This is the water submerging the weir and the footpath as it boils over it:

This is an image of the waters rushing downstream, taken from the middle of the road bridge. Once again, the trees in the water are usually above the riverbank:

Remember in the first image, pre-flooding of the river, the pier supporting the road bridge where it was well back from the water's edge?

This shot is looking up the main street from the point on the road bridge where I took those images:

And again, the river upstream where it has cut the low level crossing between the North and South of town and even submerged the pedestrian walkway higher up on the bank (note the pine log fence - that's on the right of the roadway that's underwater and the pedestrian footpath on their left):

One last image, before I bore you all to death, LOL!:

More rain is forecast for the rest of the week right up until Friday. While we were watching all of this I said to Rhonda:

 "You know, we have three, possibly four generations of Australians most of whom have never experienced this volume of rain, yet, we two have seen more rain and more violent flooding than this!"

A Christmas song

Rhonda and I stayed at a motel last night and went to dinner at a Chinese restaurant - very nice place! This morning I took her to breakfast at the Liberty Cafe, where I often had breakfast when I was working up this way by myself and unable to get home. She ordered 'Bacon and Eggs'.

I said "Are you sure?" She said "Yes!" So I said "OK!  I'll have the same!"

When Con bought over to our breakfast she was gobsmacked! Three slices of toast, two fried eggs, 3 full rashers of bacon and a great pile of chips - served on those large diner lunch plates that could double for manhole covers. He also bought her a pot of black coffee and a pot of extra strong tea for myself.

I said to Rhonda - "Arn't you pleased you didn't order the sausages as well!" She just looked at me all stunned like.



We've had 178mm of rain in 5 days - over 7 inches in non-metric scale - we went for a walk after having breakfast (Rhonda needed to 'walk it off') and I took some photos of the Yass River running a 'banker'. I'll post those in another post later!

Why we like living in Yass

The population of Sydney on December 2nd 2010 is approximately 4,514,357 within an area of 2058/sq.km. It is about 291 klms by road, a journey that takes approximately 3 hours and 13 minutes along a four lane divided highway.
Sydney has a population density of around 2,200 persons/sq.km


Melbourne is Australia's second largest city, a diverse and multicultural city and has a projected population of 4,062,290 by 2011 for an area of 8833/sq.km. Melbourne is about 602kms by road, a journey that takes approximately 6 hours and 54 minutes, again (mostly) along a four lane divided highway.
Melbourne has a population density of around 460 persons/sq.km

Sydney to Melbourne is linked by the Hume Highway, of which Yass is the first significant stop on the way south. Yass is a town in the Southern Tablelands of New South Wales, Australia, in Yass Valley Shire. The name appears to have been derived from an Aboriginal word, "Yarrh" (or "Yharr"), said to mean 'running water'. Yass is located about 280 km southwest of Sydney, on the Hume Highway. The Yass River, which is a tributary of the Murrumbidgee River, flows past the town. Yass is 56 km from Canberra.

The Yass area was first seen by Europeans in 1821, (an expedition led by Hamilton Hume) and by 1830 settlement had begun. It was founded where the nascent Sydney to Melbourne road crossed water in the form of the Yass River. The Yass local government area has a population of 13,135 and comprises the town of Yass and Villages of Binalong, Bookham, Bowning, Gundaroo, Murrumbateman, Sutton and Yass.
The Yass area covers 3,298sq.kms giving a population density of around 4 persons/km2.

Corner of Comur, Laidlaw and Rossi Streets, looking up the main street towards the PO clock tower (complete with a real bell chime that chimes the hours and half hours from 6am to 8pm)

Hume Bridge over the Yass river and Riverbank Park

A view of the countryside in the Yass area

Hamilton Hume returned to Yass area and purchased

"Cooma Cottage" where he lived with his wife until his death in 1873.

Yass Valley LGA has earned a reputation as the "Fine Wool Capital of the World" and the development of Yass Valley LGA stemmed from its strong agricultural base.

Its a no-brainer, really!  Despite the drawbacks of no public transport, no gay cosmopolitan lifestyle, no fine dining, wining and entertainment facilities, what we lose on the merry-go-round we pick up on the slippery dip with a nice quite town, no overcrowding, smog-free air and you can walk up the shops and almost all you meet will say hello to you, if not call you by your first name. Yass has a thriving arts and crafts industry and tourism is well supported by a prominent Visitors Information Centre.

The Yass/Murrumbateman region is famous for its 'cold climate wines'. Helm Wines is an owner operated family winery located in the Canberra District. The winery was given a 5 star rating by James Halliday in 2009, and is well known for producing award-winning Rieslings and Cabernet Sauvignons. Helm Wines is one of about 40 boutique cool climate Canberra wineries (established in 1973), one of the first commercial wineries in the Canberra District Wine Region.

Helm Wines is fortunate enough to be frequented by many wildlife visitors as well as the human ones! Regular visitors include Winston the Echidna, Wagner the Kookaburra and Amadeus the Wallaby.

Keith Rupert Murdoch, AC, KSG an Australian-born American media magnate and the founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of News Corporation owns the Cavan Property outside of Yass. Obtaining images of this property can be very difficult as Murdoch guards his privacy very closely and security is high, however, this is the country that forms part of the property:

and here is an image of inside the homestead:

The comfortable Spanish-style house is large

enough for all of Rupert Murdoch's children

and their children at one time.

Charles Bean's Great War

Charles Bean was an Australian historian. he was the Official War Historian for the Australian government during World War One.

In Novemeber this year, 2010, Foxtel's History channel released a series called Charles Bean's Great War. The thing here is not that he was Australian, its more a thing that he was one of a handful, that few fully accredited and unbiased journalists that compiled as near a complete history of the battle action of WWI.

Watch out on your History Channel for this epic rendition of what he saw and recorded for posterity.

It's a pity more people did not take notice of him at the time. I was privileged, when doing my under-graduate studies as a Bachelor of Arts student at the Australian National University, studying Australian History,  to benefit through Legacy Australia to gain access to study areas that would have otherwise been beyond my means - more by 'approved access' than through dollar costs.

Legacy is dedicated to caring for the families of deceased veterans. Today Legacy's caring and compassionate service assists over 100,000 widows and 1900 children and dependants with a disability. Legacy is a voluntary organisation supported by veterans, servicemen and women, and volunteers drawn from all walks of life. Our support and services now extend to include the dependants of members of today's Australian Defence Force who lose their lives as a result of their military service.

My Christmas video offering

I'm not a great Christmas fan but I do like to join in the festivities, so here is my first Christmas musical video offering:



At the same time, while not quite "Christmas" our family always loved this Rolfe Harris song and it was often sung at Christmas gatherings!:



Charles Bean was the official Australian War Historian and many of those images in this video portrayed Australian troops, or, areas in which they were deployed, during WWI.  I really think its a pity that near a whole generation of young Australians from a very young country lost their lives and their Christmas's to come. How many "little boys" would have been born to enjoy Christmas but for WWI?

Phewwww!

Feel like a grub and must smell like a grub! 

As you know we (i.e. Rhonda) have been painting our laundry, bathroom, toilet and entrance alcove for the last five days - well overdue as it turns out, as Rhonda washed the lace liner curtains on Day one and her fingers went straight through them.

In the meantime we have not been able to shower - that - and add rain +++, humidity and thunderstorms and, well ....... all we've been able to do is to 'tub wash' and use copious amounts of deodorants.

Here's a few images:

Wall colour is Wattyl ID brand semi-sheen called 'cool cucumber'. doors, window surrounds, architraves, etc are done in a Wattyl ID silky satin white.

The 'Loo' LOL!

The 'tradie' hard at their task!

Poor old Denny - this is the second 'paint job' he's lived through,

so he now knows what's expected of him!

I seized on a 'window' break in the rain and got the Victa mower out this morning and mowed the ankle deep grass in the yard - good job, 'cos its now raining again! Then I fueled both vehicles at the local 'servo', re-filled the mower fuel cans, picked up the mail from the post office and when I got home I took our defunct wine cooler fridge out and put it in the trailer to go to the metal recycling.

Phewwwww! I wonder why some people looked at me in a funny way in the PO queue! LOL!

Anyhow, As we are getting a little bit whiffy, I've booked us into a local motel for the night (one of their recently renovated courtyard suites) on Friday night so that we can both have a good shower and scrub. Then we are booked into the Fook Lee Loi Chinese Restaurant in town and we'll stay the night in the motel.

Fook Lee Loi is special to us. It was a good restaurant being run-down and then got sold to a very industrious young Chinese couple who moved into town, proceeded to run and up-grade the restaurant standard and produce two lovely boys of their own in the interim. They even managed to relocate her elderly parents from Taiwan  and they now live with them, helping wherever they can. The cuisine is a delightful mixture of traditional Szechuan food and Cantonese cooking. I get lots of ideas for my recipes every time we dine there!

Saturday we are heading to "The Camp" for two nights and be back Monday as I have a specialist orthopaedic appointment in Canberra on Tuesday! My poor old right knee is giving out and it looks like I need a new titanium one - at least they'll chime in unison when I walk through airport security points! LOL!

How does your garden grow?

My pumpkins have finally taken.

Another week and I'll be able to remove the "Denny barrier"!

My snow peas have shot up, bloomed and now fruiting.

My tomato bushes have fruit forming.

And, my climbing beans - in the white foam box, are reaching the top of the shade trellis.

We had another 15mm of rain last night, taking us to 78mm in 24hours and it is still raining with a 90% chance of more rain forecast for the next 5 days.

After Rhonda finishes her painting today, we are going to Cusack's at Kingston and to some fabric shops at Curtain and Blind Creations  at Fyshwick (two of the ACT larger shopping areas) tomorrow to buy some new curtain materials and then we head to "The Camp" for a few days, Friday to Sunday - may as well be up there in the rain as much as sitting around here in it! LOL!