Thunder and Lightning

My big sister who always had these brilliant ideas on what next to do in the holidays, suggested that we take a blanket and walk to the camp on the far side of the farm, and have a picnic there.  At the time, two of our cousins were staying with us.  A girl cousin and a boy cousin.

Off we set, omitting to tell anyone where we were heading.  After about an hour, we arrived at our destination, a large gully running into a dam.

Being the height of summer, we clean forgot that more often than not, summer thunder storms would make their appearance from mid to latish afternoon.  As luck would have it, up came the most violent, scary thunder storm to beat all thunder storms.  All we could do was huddle together under the blanket, which afforded no protection whatsoever!  All it did was block out the flashes of lightning which constantly ripped across the sky followed by massive claps of thunder.

We all crouched at the side of the gully, with water rushing beneath us and rain pouring down through the blanket on top of us.  We were terrified!  After what seemed like a very long time, the lightning and thunder subsided, the rain stopped and the sun, the glorious sun came out once more.

We crawled out from under the blanket and surveyed the scene.  Water was rushing everywhere.  Down the gully, and into the dam.  Rivulets were making there way through the grass and forming little puddles.  My middle sister slipped at the top of the gully and promptly found herself sliding all the way to the bottom on her rear end.  That was all the encouragement we needed.  Throwing caution to the wind, we stripped off our clothes down to our nickers and shrieking with laughter proceeded to have a whale of a time sliding down the embankment again and again.  We were covered in mud, but couldn't care less.

Our hilarity however, came to an abrupt end when over the rise we spied my aunt.  By the look on her face, she could have given the storm a good go!  She seemed more angry that we had gone off without having told anyone where we were going to, than glad that we had not been struck by lightning!  I wasn't sure which was more scary, my aunt or the storm, but by the time we arrived home, I knew without a shadow of a doubt, that it definitely had to be my aunt.

We all got a good telling off that night but my big sister being the eldest, bore the brunt of it.  To make matters worse, we had left the soggy blanket behind.  Was it all worth it?  You can bet your bottom dollar it was!  We would have done it again at the drop of a hat.