It’s raining.
A lot.
Dark, foreboding (and indeed currently boding) clouds are rolling across the Cape Town sky, propelled by a gusty Northwester, and dropping a lot of water on the Southern Suburbs (and elsewhere, I’d wager).
The racing at Kenilworth has been abandoned:
Following 16.5mm of rain overnight, with more rain expected throughout the day, horses were brought to the course to gallop.
The feedback was that the going was inconsistent. In the interests of the safety of both horses and riders, the race meeting scheduled for today has been abandoned.
I think that “the feedback was that the going was inconsistent.” is actually code for “the jockeys had a chat while galloping through the driving rain and – quite reasonably – decided “sod this”.”
While this rain might not seem like a good thing at the moment, we do need it. Dam levels this time yesterday were at 68.3%. Dam levels this time last year were 96.8%.
We’re a bit behind where we need to be.
But we really shouldn’t worry too much. The next ten days are packed full of precipitation:
More than 25mm already here today, and I’m very excited about our temporary rim-flow pool.
The Cape Rain Frogs are going mad in the back garden, chirping their celebratory noises at the miserable conditions. At the other end of the animal scale, the beagle – wrapped in seventeen blankets – has decided that perhaps the best way to get through today is just to sleep until tomorrow.
My thinking is that the beagle might have hit upon a rather good idea.