Rain

I used to not like the rain.

Half the reason I moved from NZ to WA was in fact the rain, and the fact that Auckland got far too much of it. In the last winter I spent there, I rode a motorbike every day, and I noticed that it in fact rained every single day in July. You tend to notice stuff like that on a bike.

Now, in the tropics, its not unusual to go 8 months or more of the year without a drop. Thats the Kimberley dry season for you, and the reason why the place packs out with hoardes of terrorists tourists every “winter”. While the rest of the country is freezing its collective buns off, we’re enjoying cloudless days and balmy nights.

Now, we are in the wet season. The place is almost deserted. Although its called the wet, we actually get very little rain in Broome. You may see thunderclouds on the weather map every night, but remember, the Kimberley is a vast region, bigger than Europe. So while its getting lots of rain overall, Broome seems to be mostly just hot, sticky, humid and generally uncomfortable unless you’re in the aircon or a (chilled) pool. Yep, even the sea is too warm to swim in.

So when we do get a good downpour, its always somewhat of a novelty. You see kids playing in the streets, even adults don’t mind getting out in it. And as the saying goes, when it does rain, it pours!

The ground, baked hard from the long dry, soaks up none of it, and the roads and drains are quickly overloaded. I took these yesterday on the Iphone, as I watched the town deluged in a mid afternoon shower.

I reckon this guys testing the electronics in his car. So far so good……

And this one is right outside Chinatown, the “main drag” in Broome. Waters over the kerb here, had to take my shoes off just to get out of the car!