Fire, fire, everywhere!

It's a hot, dry summer here in the Cape. Fire-fighters have been constantly on the go with runaway veld fires, shack fires, arson, the rich folk's stuff going up in smoke. Yesterday, on the way to drop my son off at art class, we found two in the area:


This was just over the mountain, barely started when the pic was taken. I don't know if it was a bush fire, or something else, but it looked like a tanker-truck that had gone up in flames! Unfortunately, a gale-force wind urged it on, and it spread rapidly over the mountain. It was dark before it was put out.


This one was next to the road, a bit further on. We drove through thick choking smoke, but the emergency and fire guys were already on the scene. By the time I picked my son up 2 hours later, it was a mere whiff of smoke.

But as we arrived home, I could see another fire burning between us and Cape Town. The water-dumping helicopter and spotter plane came over our house a few times before everything died down.

We haven't had a good burn on the mountains for a while now. Plants such as the protea depend on fire for their reproduction. It's all good and well that we are trying to protect our houses and people, but nature sometimes has a cycle it must follow. And as much as we fight it, we are mere visitors in the environment. If all humans disappeared tomorrow, it wouldn't take long for nature to reclaim her space and reinstate her rhythm.