I spent the last month in Ketchum, Idaho (more commonly known as Sun Valley), staying in a friend's cabin. We were no more than 10 miles from the burn area of the Beaver Creek Fire, and got a LOT of morning smoke (at night, as the air cooled, the smoke would 'drain' down into the valley). Pretty miserable at times, and we finally left a few days early.
Interestingly enough, the BBC had among the best pictures of the fire:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-23759610The helicopter shown carries a 'tube' into which they suck water from the streams and lakes, and then dump it onto 'hot' spots. It was a daily site for some time.
There is an estimated 8 billion (with a
'B') dollars worth of homes in the Sun Valley area. A lot of insurance companies brought in their own firefighting crews to protect specific homes only. The revenue loss for the summer is huge, and most hikers/bikers/campers/fishermen/etc bailed out of the area. Ketchum (the town merges into Sun Valley; both are quite small) was virtually a ghost town.
Despite a population of only 2400, Ketchum serves up 94 restaurants according to Yelp. Only four were open by the time we left. Since there were so few open, you still needed reservations! One restaurant answering service said "We're open through the smoke! We're open through the fire! We're open until they kick us out!"
Another factoid: no mail delivery in Sun Valley/Ketchum. You can only use a Post Office box. The post office, despite the small population, has over 8000 boxes!
Cool place.
Er...
HOT place!
