An Early Monsoon

Monsoon season usually starts around July 4, but this year we've had storm cloud build-ups every afternoon since the beginning of June. It's very early. But nothing came of the threats and I've had to water my new plants every day as they sat withering in parched soil.

Yesterday the monsoon delivered and it was classic. We had 45 minutes of biblical deluge that was 2 months' worth of rain.

Big Red the Rainbarrel gave up after 20 minutes and cascaded waterfalls into my garden

For a brief while we had a resort paradise like no other -- we enjoyed lakeside seating at Lake Turquoise:

A nice seat at the lake's edge

And there were unseasonal snow sports, but the sledding was quite poor:

Winter sports weren't great, though

We had wild river excursions on the Rio Nava Ade:

The river flows, oddly, uphill to the higher side of my garden

My gardens got more than drenched. Pools and eddys and ponds and waterfalls appeared and the rain gauge recorded an amount for the first time since I bought it last winter. I didn't even think it worked until now.

Can you read the rain gauge? 1.25 inches in 45 minutes

The kitchen door flooded, the back slider leaked in torrents and the rain barrel was useless. It's a big empty red plastic container most of the time, but when it does finally rain it overtops and drowns all below it. I'm not sure I understand rain barrel technology.

The rain barrel, overtopped and frothing

I am not going to have to water anything for a while. We still have a lake on the front porch and a river at the side and 65 gallons of rainwater sitting in the rain barrel.

I may go fishing for trout in the river

This was early. Monsoon isn't a thing until summer. Will we get more in July and August?