Not many words but a lot of water

Dear Diary,

It all happened so quickly.

It was raining. Nothing unusual there eh? One minute I was typing up a blog (the previous one) with one eye out of the window watching the rain and waiting for my daughter to arrive. We had spoken on the phone, nothing was amiss and she said she would pop over for a cuppa. I could see the river bridge from my desk and noticed that the water level was rising and would soon reach the bottom of the bridge. As I typed on I noticed it was starting to wash over the bridge. M said it was starting to flood a bit downstream, this is common and not usually a worry. The heavy rain continued.

I even waxed lyrical again in my blog about the joys of living in Wales and never being far from water (!). My daughter arrived and seemed concerned about the state of the roads, she wanted to ring her brother and warn him. 'Why' says I? What are you on about?

'Flooded roads, she said, really bad'.

The flood was spreading, I noticed that and the rain was becoming torrential. I quickly posted my blog and went downstairs to survey the waters. They were 'over' quite a lot but we didn't think it worth rescuing the bench, the waters were a bit deep, not too deep but we couldn't be bothered, used as we are to moderate overspill! Little did we know what was to come. Now I know why they are called flash floods. It probably took only half an hour before it was lapping at the back door.

The neighbours called round and helped us. My son arrived to help and then my son-in-law too as some sheep had got stranded in the field and were too 'dull' to move to safer ground but luckily E, a friend and my son managed to move them just before he arrived. Everyone got stuck in and helped us. I called the council and then later the Fire Service as I had been told they were in the area and they arrived with sandbags, God bless them. They said the roads were very bad, even for them. They also made drainage channels further up the road to try to divert the water as it flows down two hills in the road to join our river.


Anyway here are some photos that show the awe-ful power of Nature. I can't convey the noise, the rush and poweful roar of the waters, you will just have to imagine it. At least it was daylight, if it floods at night it is even more frightening.

And in future? We have plans now to cut down some trees across the other side of the river so the water can flow by more easily and to put in some heavy boulders on this side in 'cages' to build a wall to prevent further flooding.

Friday morning.

September 5th 2008

Before

The flood begins

We caught the sight of the bridge being 'moved'

Views from my bedroom window

Edging towards the back door

Edging towards the front door

Back garden

Well it's Sunday now, it's a day off and I am hoping that the worst of the rain has passed. The river has receded, she is flowing really slowly by as if butter wouldn't melt in her mouth. I will have to begin with housework, laying all the rugs again and general cleaning up. Then I will have to try to put the garden to rights by clearing all the flood debris while assessing along the way what is 'missing'. I know I have lost a lovely bench, loads of pots, nearly all my plastic garden chairs, special stones and a little stone squirrel. All our logs are wet as they were in the riverside forge across the road.

A little stone frog has been found on the riverbank though; I have named him 'Lucky'. And lucky is what we are, because, although it came very, very close, the flood water didn't enter the cottage. The rain stopped just in time.

There are so many folk worse off than me, all over the UK and I should not moan about a bit of tidying up.

A little footnote:  The granddaughters have been by and pointed out that Lucky the frog could swim and that is why he was safe.  Silly Nanny!

Bye for now,
Go mbeannai Dia guit,
Cait