Ok. We’re back. Here's my story.
First, We're very lucky. The fires are still burning and they are surrounding us in a sort of backward 'C' pattern. The open part of the ‘C’ is the ocean. San Diego is surrounded by wooded and rural areas. Kinda like a modern city that tapers out into the woods. However instead of a city with less and less woods, foliage we have it thought the city. To the south we have Mexico. Mexico is a tinderbox. If it’s burning down there all those little shacks are going to spread fast.
At this point 500,000 people have been evacuated. (I just heard one million people) I still cannot get a hold of my parents living in Mexico where I think there's a fire. I just got in a short while ago and I'll looking though the Google Fire Mash ups. I missed most of events since I was to start my vacation. I don't 'care' about our ruined vacation but I'll give a run down anyway.
We rented a truck to take some of our possessions to Vegas and we were going to see Spam-A-Lot and check out some houses. It took us about 10 hours to get to Vegas when it normally just takes 5. So we we unable to do our plan. The sky was thick with smoke. It looked like something out of Fallout. The whole experience screamed: “After The Bomb”. That was on Saturday. During the fires we had hurricane force winds (according to the news) and several...SEVERAL semi trucks were over turned on their side. I was driving a giant SUV truck and it was difficult to keep under control. The wind would gust and blow the truck a few inches to the side. We got to Vegas and moved the check in time for the hotel. This meant we had to take everything inside since it would be foolish to leave things outside. Do we took a truck full of items inside and had to leave the Tron machine out. Fortunately nobody did anything to it. Also the properties we were going to look at were rented out.
SO the next day we took everything out of the hotel room and packed it into the truck. We drove to the unit and drove back.
So if anyone wants to know about my vacation… there you have it. It was pretty much a bust but we don’t have a smoldering pile of ashes to come back to so we’re fortunate. If my parents are alive then I’m really fortunate. I just feel sorry for all those people at the stadium right now.
Here's what parts of the trip looked like. You know the scene from Lord of The Rings (or Return of the king) where they see the clouds around Mordor? That's what it looked like. Dark, Grey and hints of red coming out. It looked like something from The Day After or some sort of war zone. We had to wear bandanas getting back. In fact… it felt like I was driving into Death. If Death had a geographic location then it felt like we were driving intot it. Smoldering hillsides, flames on the side, thick air and a glow in the distance to suggest something worse with the weird light just gave it a unnatural feeling.
We weren't sure if we were being smart or foolish coming back. Smart if we come back and rescue the car and other essentials. Foolish if we get trapped. Foolish if we wait and COULD have saved the car and valuables. Smart if the area burns and we save things. Our lives are important but if we can save a automobile with a small degree of risk then it’s a logical chance. (Without a car it would be hard to work) Fortunately everything is ok here. I live in Old Town San Diego which is the birthplace of California. I'm within walking distance of the original buildings so it's pretty certain they're going to try to protect that... at least more so. My reasoning is: Old Town is a money maker for San Diego in addition to being a historical site. I’m sure they’ll try to save a housing area but given the choice between a few houses and Adobe buildings from 1820, they’ll save the buildings even if they won’t admit it.
Well… I’m tired and my words are a bit jumbled but I thought I should post something. We're going to pack some items just incase there's a evacuation call.
Going to bed. Hugs everyone.
Edit: To the idiot smokers out there. You would THINK… if there’s a brush fire out there… you wouldn’t throw your lit cigarette out the window as you’re passing though dry country. I saw three people do that on the way to Vegas. Amazing.
pss. Here's some photos. I didn't take them.
Flickr: The San Diego Wildfires October 2007 Poolps. This is what the lighting looked like.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2059/1712936169_658e8989f1.jpgHere's a few more, I thought were interesting.
