U3A Writing: The Smell Of....
"I recognised the smell immediately. It was the unmistakable smell of burning eucalyptus leaves...'' Ilse Erber tells of a frightening bush fire in Western Australia.
It had been an uncomfortably hot night, so I was happy to get up at daybreak. I crept down the hall so as not to wake my still slumbering house guests and walked up our hill to the service station on the highway to buy the morning paper.
It was an oppressive morning with not the slightest suggestion of the cool sea breeze which usually blew softly at this time of the morning. The last few days had all been unpleasantly hot and dry, and this day would be no different.
later in the morning, with breakfast eaten, dishes washed and beds made, we decided that even the beach would be unpleasant on a day such as this promised to be. So we headed for Chatswood, Australia’s largest regional shopping centre, where we planned to lose ourselves in the air conditioned stores and to hunt for bargains among the post Christmas sales.
These sales bring out the worst in people as they tear desired bargains from other shoppers’ hands and push rivals out of the way. After two hours of this treatment and with few bargains to show for our bruises, we decided to head for home. Perhaps a sea breeze would have come in and it would be cooler outside.
But as I nosed the car gingerly out of the relative coolness of the underground parking station, I soon realised that conditions outside were worse than before. The sky was now a murky grey-black colour, as though a great storm was imminent. The car windows were open, and as we reached the main road a strong acrid smell in the air made me sneeze uncontrollably.
I recognized the smell immediately. It was the unmistakable smell of burning eucalyptus leaves - the smell of bushfire smoke, which we could now see rising from the direction of the National Park to the west of the highway.
At the same time the shrill sirens of fire engines could be heard coming at great speed up the highway. Together with the other drivers on the road, I pulled to the left as we allowed the convoy of four fire engines to pass us.
Two kilometres further north I turned the car into our street and was relieved to see that all was peaceful there, although I could see smoke rising beyond the end of the street where many houses bordered the bushland. Later I was to learn that houses two streets away had been evacuated.
That evening as we listened to news reports of the fires, a loud bang like the sound of a nearby gunshot startled us. The following day we learned that a house half a kilometre away had imploded.
Later in the evening we walked as far as we dared down the neighbouring streets. Although everything looked peaceful, there was always the pervading smell of bushfire smoke and the shrill sirens of approaching fire engines to remind us of what lay ahead.
Although my house did not adjoin the nearby bushland, I packed an emergency suitcase with insurance certificates, bank books and irreplaceable family photographs before I went to bed.
I was relieved to hear the following morning on an early news broadcast that the street where I lived was now out of danger, but only a short walk away many homes had been destroyed.
It was several months before the homes were rebuilt. But the Australian bush is resilient, and within a few weeks eucalyptus trees were putting out new leaves. The smell of the burnt vegetation lingered in the air for a long time after the worst of the bushfire scars had healed.
