And while there was some excitement with the rising river level, there were no real risks or flood fears.

Deputy controller for the Namoi SES Heath Stimson wasn’t the only one who noticed the fresh in the river at the main Peel bridge when he was on his way to work – plenty of others did too.

Mr Stimson said there’d been a bit of a run in the system with a peak forecast early Friday.

“But at 3pm it was falling back down; all of those streams seem to be on the way down again,” he said.

The river had lifted by over 1.5 metres at one stage, fuelled by a surge from the Cockburn River system finding its way from around Niangala, and from Goonoo Goonoo Creek, coming down from around Crawney, south of Nundle.

Mr Stimson said there’d also been a rise in the Peel around Piallamore which had added to the flow.

Around the district, it’s a case of all the rivers run – and there’s been plenty of anecdotal evidence of local streams overflowing and isolating property owners.

A Leader news crew on Friday was one of those caught mid-stream during a trip to Nundle, but the creek that stranded them on the wrong side of the road fell fairly quickly.

While all the talk might have been about the continuing lift in the levels of Tamworth’s main supply dam, Chaffey, there’s also been some good news for our biggest dam off the Namoi system.

Keepit Dam is up nearly 2 per cent of capacity in a week and has more than doubled its storage in the space of two months. It was at 18.8 per cent on Friday morning.

Chaffey Dam continued its rise through the week too, putting on nearly 5 per cent since last Friday. It’s the highest the dam has been since December 2013.

Chaffey stood at 39.7 per cent at 4pm Friday and had put on an extra 1 per cent in just 24 hours, fed by snow and rain high in the catchment above Nundle earlier in the week.