Lake Ninan, Everlastings, and Interesting Spring Weather

in Perth, the start of spring 2016  has been declared  the most cold and wet in decades.

This kind of spring weather has made our outings hard to plan, and has us watching radar maps a lot as we travel.

One of our first stops today was Lake Ninan near Wongan Hills.

Lake Ninan was once a thriving saline wetland ecosystem home to abundant fish and bird life. But like many wheat belt areas, over the years deforestation and farming has caused the water table and salinity levels to rise. The lake is affected by everything that happens in the catchment area that extends north as far as Bindi Bindi. Fish species that were once abundant are no longer consistently present, and the numbers and variety of birds has reduced due to lack of food in the lake.

Lake Ninan has played a significant role in the life and times of Wongan Hills Shire since early settlement days. Around 1910 water from the lake was carted up to the town by camels to supply steam trains, and housewives used to go down to the lake to wash their families’ clothes.

In the 1950’s and 60’s, salt was mined from the lake and a tent settlement and school were set up nearby.

Throughout the history of settlement in the area the lake has been a meeting place and recreation site used for boating, water skiing, swimming, picnics, scout camps and fishing – although rising salinity and environmental degradation has made it less suitable for recreation than it once was.

Not sure I can accurately describe Lake Ninan. It’s a combination of creepy, strange, and beautiful at the same time. It’s almost ghost-like.

It can almost feel haunting, nothing to hear but the salt crunching under your feet and the howling of the wind.

With little to see or do, after a few photos, we decided to leave…

As we were leaving, just a few feet down the road, I spotted some unexpected color that looked like everlastings!

Closer inspection revealed, not the kind of everlasting we are used to, but yet another. Seemed like such an odd location to see such colorful life.

Driving through the little town of Wongan Hills we see the kind of Everlastings we’re used to.

For many reasons, we don’t look at bad weather as a reason to stay home.

I could never get tired of these views as we made our way towards Toodyay.

I am a very content gal with big open Aussie skies with drama.

A quick stop outside of Goomaling. Love stopping to look at this place.

If there is a favorite place in springtime for me on earth, I guess it would be this spot. Everlasting flowers that cover the woods for as far as the eye can see.

We also end up here late in the day, near dark. I wonder what it looks like in sunshine?

At this point, I decided to take a movie because photos alone just did seem to capture the essence of how broad the blanket of everlastings was…

As we devoted our time and cameras to the woods floor….we missed the story that was going on above…

Mammatus clouds and I think I had had enough of drama big skies. Time to go home.

Spring in Australia doesn’t seem that different from back home.