In 1996 we went to Madeira for the first time on a walking holiday. One of the walks was the well known Valley of the Nuns walk from Eira do Serrado. However my intrepid husband wanted to do it in reverse for some reason I can't remember. This meant climbing up out of the Valley of the Nuns rather than descending into it, which would have been much easier.
It's very steep. Every time you think you can see the summit disappointment follows when you get there. At some point I realised there was quite a bit of smoke to our left, blown towards us by the wind, which was gusty. I became more & more concerned. We had reached the point of no return & started to walk through recently burnt undergrowth. My husband insisted we were fine. I believed him. So we continued upwards.
We did reach the top having walked for hours meeting no one. When we got there it was like Offa's Dyke. Loads of Germans there to see the views & people picking chestnuts.
My point is that it was probably really foolish. Instead of blindly following my husband I should possibly have done what instinct told me to & returned to some semblance of civilisation. But I trusted him. We had been in dodgy situations before on our travels & always survived. Often having had amazing experinces that holidaymakers don't have. I always believed I could achieve anything so long as we were together. He was unflappable.
Nearly 30 years on the world has changed. Wildfires now are affecting every region of the world because of complex socio economic factors. Records are being broken all the time for area burned, numbers of fires & fire intensity.
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/global-maps/MOD14A1_M_FIRE/MOD_LSTD_M
In January 2009, the second time we went to Madeira, my house was flooded by a water escape from the loft while we were away, which devastated two thirds of my house. It took months to dry out & a full year to rebuild. That was clean water.
Now the world is suffering from flooding on a scale unimaginable a decade or so ago. We are getting used to torrential rain even in the UK. Flooding, landslides, crop failure, death & disaster result.
https://floodlist.com/
Drought impacts food, fuel, and freshwater. Droughts result in significant, long-term economic losses & can cause major human health impacts. https://www.drought.gov/international
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/5dceec104a384df094e65af12a274959/
The point is it isn't that we don't know what is happening. We live in an age of instant communication & reliable scientific research. But we are human. We all have this capacity to ignore our better instincts & put uncomfortable truths into boxes in our brains. We believe that things will sort themselves out. We resist real change & want to maintain the status quo.
It won't work this time. We do have the capacity to solve this existential climate emergency. But we have to make difficult decisions & make difficult changes. Time is running out. We just need to all face up to it.
Or my 18 year old grandsons don't have a future anything like my past.
<a href="https://pikbest.com">Free templates from pikbest.com</a>
No comments:
Post a Comment