Ther jumpingaround.com crew headed down to to Mortlake in the farming area known in Victoria, Austraia as the Western DIstrict - an area known for its rich grazing land where horses, cattle and sheep graze happily on the soil rick grass.

But this has not been the case in 2006/2007 as the drought worsens and the government does little to less than nothing to help the farmers who are after all the backbone of Australia - so the farmers battle on, as they have always done.

Showjumping is very popular in the Western District and Caramut Riding Club is one of the oldest Riding Clubs in Victoria. The local members and competitors are almost all involved in farming in some way and when we covered this show last year many packed up very quickly on the Sunday as word spread that the fires were too close for comfort to many of those at the show - luckily none at the show lost property or stock.

With temperatures forecast for high 30's this weekend with a possible cool changeon Sunday everyone was looking forward to a good weekend. The grounds looked fabulous and the hardworking committee had been keeping the water (bore water) up to the grounds to ensure the jumping would be excellent and on our arrival we could see just how good it looked - and then a quick stroll across the arena confimed this was an excellent surface.

The Club decided this year to put on a sponsors tent with drinks and nibbles supplied which was a great innovation - everything was set for a great weekend in one of Victoria's quaintest country towns.

So Friday evening dinner was at the local, the Mt Shadwell and many stayed on for many games of pool and lots of laughter and fun - and at about 9pm the rain started - for many it was a moment to go out and play in the "wet stuff" they hadn't seen for some 3 months - nobody, for one moment expected the rain to keep up in a heavy, drenching way for the entire night and at 8am on Saturday morning the decision was mde to cancel the show.

This was done to save the grounds as to jump on them would have surely ruined all the hard work done to prepare it in the first place.

The show has been POSTPONED and will be run - some of the suggestions for the new dates are around the 3rd weekend in February or possibly the weekend prior to the Mount Gambier Easter Show.

On our 4 hour drive back to the Mornington Peninsula we had rain most of the drive and it was the type of rain which will hopefuly put growth into the fields and feed in the mouths of the stock.

As I sit and write this the rain is still falling heavily and we hear that there is a possibility that the showjumping in Eastern Victoria's Lang Lang may also be cancelled due to the heavy rain.

For many reading this from countries such as Ireland you will not think much of shows being cancelled due to rain - in Australia this is virtually unheard of! We don't cancel shows due to extreme heat and we don't usually have enough rain to warrant cancelling shows - but as Australia sits in the grip of an incredibly severe drought this rain is welcomed with great happiness!

Keep an eye on our Index page for the new dates for the Western District Showjumping Championships.