CWB predicting an 80% chance of rain today. Some rain would be very welcome but not sure where it's going to come from. Hope they're right.

We've been getting rained on all afternoon, actually since late morning. Good thing I hit the beach early.

It's definitely coming from the south. Our porch is soaked and I've been trying to get things done on it. But, yes, we need the rain, and this is a perfect rain for crops.

Five minutes after my last posting, a box of wood on the porch collapsed. What a mess.

I'd say 'the cat did it'.

i was pretty impressed with that rain prediction by CWB - and i'm not impressed that often by them. In fact, I would be interested to know how they did it. There didn't seem to be anything in the pressure charts, the sat, or even the radar (until it was actually happening) to indicate that it was going to rain. In previous years there has been one or two events like that around this time - kind of like a thunder and lightning storm but without the thunder and lightning - and not apparently caused by a low pressure to the south of us, which is the usual case (though i just noticed that there is something forming mid-east ppe now).

In the end, we did get a few short sharp downpours in XC that night - but still only 16ml in total, then another couple of ml the next day - nothing like the amounts you got just up the road.

Went to have afternoon tea at an expensive ming su this afternoon - that would have to be a weather watcher's paradise - full uninterupted panoramic views up and down the coast and way up high - i'd say about 5-600 m above sea level - at one stage there were blue skies to the north and rain to the south - and we seemed to be standing right on the crest of it - and then some more patches of blue sky to the west where the afternoon sun was peaking through. And you could see it changing dramatically even as you watched. It's definitely worth taking a drive up that road to check it out. With all your land searching, you've probably been up there - it's the turn off to the dulan mountain trail, but right at the bottom, just near 11, it forks - the one i went up is to the left - the right one goes to the hiking trail - ashamed to say i have never been up it, but no doubt that's also similarly spectacular.

I know which road you're talking about, but haven't been up that high. Still, for some reason, we see some dramatic shifts in weather where we are. Just today the winds have shifted from south to north then back again at least twice. It's truly fascinating. They're coming out of the north now. This approaching front is taking its time rolling in, and we seem to be in that no-man's land of pressure systems. I can be sitting on my driveway, looking at the ocean, with the wind slamming into me out of the south, yet the clouds are racing in from the north, then visa versa. Wow.

Still, it would be nice to witness it all from a higher perspective. I'll have to get up there sometime.