In the early morning light a strange mournful beauty hung over the lagoon; the sombre green-black fronds of the gymnosperms, intruders from the Triassic past, and the half-submerged white-faced buildings of the 20th century still reflected together in the dark mirror of the water, the two interlocking worlds apparently suspended at some junction in time, the illuision momentarily broken when a giant water-spider cleft the oily surface a hundred yards away.
Much of the low-lying urban centre of Brisbane is under water, with reports of crocodiles and even a shark in the flooded streets.