Tuesday, February 23, 2010

When Lakes Become Rivers

I'm back from the coast after a fabulous 3 days of loafing around-walking along the foreshore-watching DVD's-listening to birds chirping all day and generally just veging out.
The place where we stayed is called Tuross Heads which is a beautiful little coastal town where people retire to and live the rest of their lives doing what they please in a leisurely manner.
There are beautiful homes built along the beach front and up into the hills around the area.
On either side of Tuross there is a lake--on the left hand side is Lake Coila and on the right hand side is Lake Tuross.
I mentioned last week that we had several days of continuous rain over the weekend in Canberra but down on the coast they had even more rain that us.
At Tuross Heads they had over 300mm of rain that weekend which caused flooding and a lot of damage.
They had also had a lot of rain 10 days earlier which caused the lakes to flood and the authorities had to cut a small channel in the sand bar to release some of the water from the lake into the ocean as it was causing flooding to some of the lower areas around the lake.
When we took Ebony down there 5 weeks ago the beaches were in pristine condition but nothing could prepare us for the damage that these storms had caused.
I took these photos mainly to show Ebony but I decided to share them with you also.
In the first photo Stephen is walking down the concrete path that leads to the beach--if you click on the photo you will see tha damage caused at the bottom by the water racing down the path.




At the bottom of the steps you can see all the tree trunks etc that had been washed up from the ocean and down the path.




In this photo you can see how the force of the rushing water carved a huge chunk out of the sand as it came gushing down--the depth of the walls is over a metre in places.

This is a photo of the beach now----
When we down there with Ebony the sand stretched as far as the eye can see-but now just behind the rocks in the centre of the photo is where the lake broke it's banks for the second time now making it impossible to walk to the other end.



In this photo you can see the water coming from Lake Coila.
Before the banks burst this whole area was sand as far as the eye could see.




Here you can see what looks like a river.
But at the point where the rocks are in the centre of the photo is where the lake wall was. and in front of it was a huge mound of sand.
If you click on this photo and the one above you will see how the water carved a wall out of the sand.




The children were having great fun sliding down the sand into the water.



10 comments:

Joei Rhode Island said...

WOW...Never rains but it Pours! Wish you could store the water for a dry spot later. Hope you enjoyed your vacation.

Janet said...

Glad you're back. I hope in spite of the erosion that you were able to have a relaxing time. It's sad when you see something like this happen. We have quite a lot of beach erosion in some of the areas here. Mother Nature is going to go wherever she wants to! It still looks like a beautiful area.

Heather said...

Great pictures Doreen. The power of water is frightening - it seems that nothing can stop it. It's sad when storms damage a favourite spot but I'm sure that evenually nature or even man, will put things right.

Robin Mac said...

Nature can be pretty fierce at times can't it. Hopefully time will bring the sand back again. Hope you had a very relaxing time anyway. Cheers, Robin

Anonymous said...

Gorgeous shots of a beautiful place.
I am always amazed at the power of water. Thanks for sharing.

Magpie's Mumblings said...

It's amazing what water can do - so much good and so much damage too. Interesting to compare the pictures.

Christine said...

Doreen, your post reminded me of a similar situation at McMasters Beach on the central coast. Council would open the lagoon sometimes after persistent rain. Council worker took 5 mins with a spade to dig the smallest trench, then the water would all rush out, carving great walls and emptying the lagoon completely to show the weeds and junk on the bottom. We loved watching the wading birds having a feed on the exposed bottom then! Of course the local kids would surf the run-out waves, silly b*ggers ! Usually done around king tide time, and would refill in about 1 week from the sea but at a lower, safe level. Nature is so powerful, isn't it??

Pat said...

It would seem that the weather all over the world has gone a little crazy. Glad you had a good break.

Maureen said...

What strange weather we are all having, we have had snow again and visiting my Aunt at the weekend we rally had lots of the white stuff, her village is tucked into the hills and they get it really bad.

Linda’s Textiles said...

Interesting photos Doreen, hope you had a relaxing break - looks a lovely place, despite the water damage.