I live in a sundrenched metropolis. Today has been gloriously wild, intermittently very wet, ever-changing, mostly cool.
Many fellow residents of Perth regard such days as “miserable” or “horrible”, to be endured, not enjoyed…and not at all photogenic.
They are wrong/blind; dry, warm sunny days are not the only “good” kind!
This photo-essay’s first chapter is all-Australian; chapter two will take you to Alaska, New Zealand and Madagascar.
The featured image was taken through a curtain of Tasmanian rain, as my beloved and I sheltered within a quasi-cavern, immediately above and behind Marriott’s Falls.
Marriot’s Falls are not far from the turnoff to Mt Field National Park.
Climbing up, beside the waterfall, is a tad hair-raising, as is climbing down again.
The walk to the falls’ base, however, is easy; it will take you through forest, grassland, and rainforest…and you will almost certainly meet some spectacular fungi.
Each image in this post – even the final one, in which bright sunshine dances in the Tropics – is the fruit of rain, either recently fallen, or falling still, as the shutter clicks.
We – and the spider who’d embroidered the indoor side of the window – were snug, as rain gently fell at the Wooden Boat Centre, beside southern Tasmania’s Huon River.
Some days later, no window separated us from the elements, in a place of absolutely no roads.
(our walk along this particular beach will be the subject of a future post. Suffice, for now, that the next two images were taken on a nicely wild day in Tasmania’s Southwest National Park)
This chapter’s final images come from three very different Western Australian places.
Respectively, they are nearly 400 kilometres southeast of Perth, just a few minutes’ drive from the city’s eastern edge, and rather more than 2,000 kilometres north.
The Stirling Range, the Darling Range, and the Kimberley Coast have far fewer rainy days than does Tasmania’s southwest.
Precisely because of that, WA’s “rain events” – and their prolonged absences – tend to produce the more dramatic results.
The above photo was taken from part way up Bluff Knoll. Toolbrunup is the peak which dominates the skyline.
The stream below is Woorooloo Brook, near Noble Falls.
