The Force of Nature

A rapid overnight thaw combined with torrential rain and gale force winds meant that the scene which awaited us this morning was in complete contrast to yesterday's. What a difference 24 hours makes! All that rain and melting snow had to go somewhere. The beautiful vistas in my previous post have been replaced by these incredible views.  I couldn't replicate all of yesterday's photos, simply because many of my viewpoints were inaccessible today, but I think you'll get the picture. If you haven't seen the previous post, do have a look and compare.

This first one shows how quickly all the snow disappeared, in just a few hours. 

The others show where it all went to!

Picture No.6 in yesterday's post shows a gateway next to a tree by the river. Here (below) you can just see the top of the gate, which gives an indication of the depth of the water. Scary!

 The river does flood quite often, but this is about the worst I have seen it since we moved here. The water you can see in the next two photos is not usually there!

The normal course of the river follows the line of trees in the centre of the next picture and then bends off to the right in the distance.

The next view is looking in the opposite direction. The direction of flow is from left to right in front of the line of trees across the middle of the picture. The tree at the LH end of the line at right angles (the tree by the gateway in the earlier pic) is normally high and dry at the edge of the near bank!

Normally I would walk through this little wood alongside the river. Couldn't do that today!

The sky is now blue again, although it's still very windy. It's two hours or so since I took the photos and already the water level has dropped quite a bit. I always wonder what happens to the creatures which live in and around the river when it floods, but they seem to cope! We saw a large hare this morning, and some swans were swimming happily on the new lake which had appeared! I'm not sure where the otters go, but they seem to come back eventually. We found a dead otter, sadly, by the roadside a few weeks ago, but have seen more otter tracks since then, so hopefully there must be several around.

This is certainly a fascinating place to live!

Flaming June??!

Not up here in Bonnie Scotland it ain't! Cold and wet describes it pretty well. We couldn't bring ourselves to put the heating on when it's practically midsummer, but the winter woollies are much in evidence.

We are lucky enough to live within sight of a river, which is an endless source of fascination. Over the past few weeks, because the weather has been uncommonly dry, the water level has been lower than usual. We have had some idyllic walks along the riverbank of an evening. Just thought I would show you a few photos.

However, for the past 24 hours it has rained virtually nonstop. Where the river normally looks like this.....

....it now looks like this!

And this view.....

......is currently this view!

Talking of currents, it is amazing, not to say frightening, how quickly the water level rises and how fast it flows, but it can also go down equally quickly. I took the photos around lunchtime today, and the water continued to rise over the afternoon. From our lounge window it looks more like a lake. It has just stopped raining now, and unless there is more rain overnight, I will expect to see the water back within its banks by tomorrow morning. * (See Edit 2, below) The speed and quantity of the flow does not seem to have much effect on the wildlife though. When I went down to take the photos, this mother goose and her four youngsters were pottering about quite happily, and they didn't seem to have any trouble staying where they wanted to!

I am pleased to note that the weather forecast for tomorrow is dry!

Edit: I went out again this evening at about 9.30 to see how things had changed. The water was considerably higher than at lunchtime, as the following photos show.

However, as you can see, the sky had cleared quite a bit and the sun peeped out for a little while before it set, so it may well be a better day tomorrow.

Edit 2: The river was indeed back in its rightful place this morning (Sunday), albeit still high and having left big puddles in the fields.