The waves may have been bigger yesterday, there has been a southerly blow working its way up the coast, and the waves are certainly quite big, and the damage done to the coast over the past little while is substantial.
We went firstly to Burleigh Heads, our favourite spot. There were heaps of surfers enjoying the swell, but it didn't seem to be too bad out there. Then we drove along to the beach just north of the Surfers shops. It is more noticeable there.
Then we drove along further north to Main Beach close to the main surf club and it is amazing how much sand has been washed away. This hasn't happened in the last week or so, but over the last few months we have had some big seas, and it's certainly washing lots of the sand away.
I took this picture standing at road level. You can see that there is a drop of about twenty feet down to the water level now.
This is looking straight down from the same spot. You can see from the size of these people walking along the beach how far down they are.
This picture is looking south towards Surfers central shopping area. There is one area at the top where the water level used to be, and now you can see it is much lower.
At one place we saw where it seems trucks are trying to replace some of the sand, but it's going to be a big job.
Just a change of subject here, petrol prices in Australia are crazy, they can change from minute to minute, hour to hour, day to day, and whenever someone, (and no one knows who this is) suddenly decides the price needs to change. We are told the prices are governed by international demand and pricing, but it does stretch the imagination to follow how that works. But as we, the man and woman in the street, or in the car, has no control over this we try and shop around for petrol.
Even though we are told the prices are governed by international trade, somehow, Tuesdays are usually cheaper than any other day. Maybe the Arabs (who provide much of the world's oil) work on Tuesdays, so we have a mini glut, bringing the prices down. Of course, the prices are always much higher on Fridays, and certainly whenever there is a long weekend when people might want to travel, therefore using more petrol, then the prices must, by international pricing principles rise. I guess it is possible that it's just a fluke, and that every long weekend there is some sort of genuine spike in petrol prices?
Woolworths and Coles, the two biggest supermarkets in Australia have pretty much cornered the market in petrol anyway, having their fabulously economical prices (forgive the tongue in cheek) and giving us the benefit of coupons for cheap petrol when we go shopping with these supermarkets that care for their customers.
So on our way home from the little sortee along the beach, what did we find? One of the Woolworths petrol stations, giving the motorist the benefit of 4 cents a litre off, if we spend $30.00 or more on food, would sell us their petrol at the magnificent price of $1.49 per litre, after the 4c comes off. So really they are charging $1.53 per litre for the poor unsuspecting mugs who need the gas.
About 2 kms further along the same road, is an independent petrol retailer, and I can't remember their name, but they would sell me their gas, with no special discounts, just the man off the street, for $1.30 per litre. 20 cents per litre cheaper!!
And another couple of kms along the road was a different independent petrol retailer selling exactly the same stuff for $1.38 per litre.
Now, I am no economist and balancing the weekly budget for bread and water is about my limit, but something tells me that $1.30, $1.38 and $1.53, for exactly the same stuff, on exactly the same day, on the same road, somehow, ain't quite right.
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