La Nina weather event puts a dampener on summer
A children’s poem sprang to mind when the BoM announced Australia is officially in the midst of a La Nina weather event.
When little girls are good, they’re very, very good. When they’re bad, however, they’re horrid. The poem my parents used to quote about the girl with the curl right in the middle of her forehead sprang to mind this week when the Bureau of Meteorology announced Australia is officially in the midst of a La Nina weather event.
Translated from Spanish as “the little girl”, that naughty La Nina has her ill-tempered sights set on our collective summer holidays, which we can only assume means more stormy tantrums and floods of tears.
How many of us have had long-awaited holidays disrupted by bad weather in the past? I can recall a giant dust storm in the Flinders Ranges that looked like something from an apocalyptic thriller as it rolled in our direction. Fraser Island was the site of a washed-out tent and sodden sleeping bags, Tasmania turned on a wild blizzard in November, and unseasonal rain during Japan’s ski season created an ice rink on every road and footpath. There have been scuppered scuba excursions in Vietnam, deep freezes in Canada and Scotland, and camping in NSW heatwaves that rendered me incapable of movement or thought.
After the craziness of the past two years, we should be used to things not going to plan. First there were the bushfires, then the pandemic. Many of us have already been confined to quarters for months.
Honestly, it never rains but it pours. Just as the borders creak open and the beaches beckon, along comes La Nina – a little black cloud in a dress, to borrow from Billy Bragg – to inundate our proverbial parades. Suddenly our suitcases will be crammed with raincoats, wellies, wetsuits and woolly jumpers. I thought our reliance on jigsaw puzzles, Netflix and board games for entertainment was over.
Still, it’s important to stay positive; I’ll take a soggy Australia over locked-down Austria any day. And given the inclemency will be focused on the east coast, there’s always the option of WA’s abundant beaches … sometime in 2022.
My family and I are supposed to be heading to Queensland in January, assuming we pass our tests and are allowed over the border. We’re hoping to kayak and snorkel and soak up the sun. It appears the emphasis will now be on the word “soak”. I spy an opportunity to finally teach my captive teenagers how to play cards as they shelter from the storms.
As for La Nina, I’m consigning her to the naughty corner until she can play nice (and dry).
