Winter and Fires

It's still cold and wintery here, though ere was nice bit of sun today for a while.  The early flowers are starting to arrive all the same! This Acacia Celastrofolia is two now and has flowered for the first time. Aw, my baby is all grown up!

The donkey orchids up at the block are out.

It was due to rain like mad last Saturday but luckily it didn't because I was off out to a RUI exercise with all our combined brigades.  RUI stands for Rural Urban Interface and basically that means anywhere where houses and bush meet.  We all got together first.

That's me standing half cut off on the very left in front. 

We were given a scenario of a fire approaching a hills suburb in three hours.  We had to go and assess the houses in that area for defendability and decide if valuable resources should be used to help save each house or if it would be impossible to save even with help. We got to go out with Lt. Dave in the 1.4, and since he is very experienced it was a very valuable exercise.

Yes the shortarse is me, thank you for asking! :)

Once we'd assessed some houses, we then we set to defend one, then another. This means running out lay flat hoses in opposite directions round the house and in a real fire we would also move any flammable things like wooden furniture or gas bottles as far away from the house as we could.  Then it was time to pack up and go debrief as to what we'd learned and discovered, and to have a sausage sizzle and some networking.  All very interesting!  I got to use the radio a lot, acting as Crew Leader under Dave's advice and that was really educational but will be happy to stay a grunt at real fires for the forseeable future!

Then it was home for a bit of a rest and then our friends Gav and Julie came up for a bonfire. It rained all afternoon, but just as they were due to arrive it fined up and we got a lovely hour or two of bonfire before the rains returned and we adjourned into the cottage for a delicious mishmash of foods for dinner.  Scruffy hospitality at its best and some of our favorite guests!

Heh, cool Uncle Andrew, picked Niamh up from school today on his motorbike because she was very keen to have a ride.  She was well excited when she came out of class and found him waiting to pick her up.  :)

I remember or our coolest cousin, Robyn, giving Jenny and I rides when we were the same age.  So much fun!