My home and property are unscathed, thanks to excellent firefighting (their wonderfulness speaks for itself)
and dumb luck (the wind shift, weather change, and topography). I am so sorry for those who lost property.
It could so easily have been my husband and me -- or any of us.
I live near the old turkey ranch property (Smith Grade and Bonny Doon Road). I was at home alone, working on
my computer next to an open door, when the fire started. My dogs howled at a fire truck, which is business
as usual, but almost immediately I got a whiff of smoke. I ran outside and saw an already large plume of
black and brown smoke over the Martin Road area. I heard people yelling in the distance. I got that sinking
feeling in my stomach that you get when you hear bad news, as I realized that what I've been fearing for so
many years was actually happening. I phoned CDF for information, but got a completely disinterested and
unhelpful woman who told me it was just a little fire on Martin and Ice Cream Grade.
That was my experience with CDF during the entire evacuation. Incorrect, contradictory, incomplete
information...very frustrating. Online and television news sources did not help much. The only good
information I got was when my husband walked into our property when the CDF said he couldn't. But back to
the evacuation for the moment.
I packed up my dogs' supplies, walked through my house and decided that I didn't want any of my stuff, phoned
my husband and confirmed that he felt the same way. I packed a few things in an overnight bag, found my
digital camera and took snaps of all the rooms of my home and the house's exterior (for insurance purposes),
and then I drove away with my beloved dogs. I assumed that I would not see my house again because I could
tell, from the rapidly growing smoke cloud, that the fire was headed toward our property, and the wind was
strong that day. I was completely at peace with the idea that my house was (probably) toast, oddly. I have
no emotional attachment to my things -- I had already let all of that go when I saw the smoke. I did feel
deeply sad about the trees, landscape, and the wildlife habitat we have encouraged on our land, as I am
currently mourning the loss of so much of the Ecological Reserve. It takes so many years to build that up
again.
I saw activity at my neighbor's house, so I decided there was no reason to check on people. I felt it was
best to get out of the way before the roads clogged up. I was out of the house within 25 minute of hearing
the first fire truck.
One funny, minor detail about evacuating is that I'd been waiting for a washing machine to be delivered when
the fire started. I phoned to try to stop the delivery truck from coming up, and the driver's manager had a
hard time grasping the concept that a delivery should not be made when a wildfire was going on (he actually
said, "But he's already on his way up there!"). I finally told him, "I'm not taking delivery of a washing
machine when it's a real possibility that my house will burn down." He gave a little laugh and started to
say, "That's fine, but..." and I said I had to go, and hung up.
As I drove out on Smith Grade, I saw that people had already gathered along the road to watch the smoke. I
passed fire trucks coming up Bonny Doon Road, and several CHP and Sheriff's vehicles. The workers at the new
Beauregard vineyard on the turkey ranch property kept working through it all. They worked the next day
during the fire, too.
I drove down to Davenport Landing and walked the dogs so they would be worn out no matter where we ended up
for the night. My husband joined me there, and we phoned and text messaged to find a place for the night.
People were wonderfully generous with their offers of shelter, but we have two dogs that even I consider
bothersome, so we ended up at the Hilton in Scotts Valley (I was surprised to learn that they are one of the
few hotels in the area that take dogs, and they did not charge us the usual extra room fee for pets, out of
good will for fire evacuees). There were many Bonny Dooners at the Hilton, and many firefighters and CDF
workers -- everyone trying to get information from everyone else.
Late Wednesday night we got it into our heads to phone our house to see if the answering machine picked up.
Of course, it didn't. I phoned PG&E and explained the situation. A very nice and understanding woman
checked and told me that that 450 customers in the area were "powered down" by PG&E. That was a relief.
On Thursday morning, we were frustrated that we couldn't get any information on where the fire line was, but
we knew that the road closures started at Smith Grade and Bonny Doon Road. So my husband drove up to that
intersection and -- along with many other residents doing the same thing -- walked in to check on our
property. Woodpecker Ridge was a command center at that point, and water was being scooped out of the pond
there by helicopters. Smoke was thick, embers were flying, so my husband stayed long just enough to grab
some clothing and our passports, and to hose down the deck and roof. What else can you do? Still, it was
good to know the house was still there.
My husband tried to do this again late Thursday afternoon, but was turned away by the CHP officer, who said
he had been reprimanded by firefighters for letting people in.
On Friday, we were going to lose our room, so we phoned around town frantically for a place, to no avail.
The CDF info-line staff people kept delaying the time they would announce when we could return to our homes.
We were told they'd know at 8:00 a.m., then noon, then mid-afternoon. We finally booked a place up in Half
Moon Bay. Then I happened to check with CDF at around noon, just to see if we could check on the property on
the way out of town, and was told that we could return home for good. When I logged onto The Sentinel later,
I read that the announcement had gone out at 11:00 a.m. -- and I had called around then and been told that we
could not return. So I was annoyed. There is a breakdown somewhere in the system, it seems.
No one was checking identification when we drove in on Smith Grade. In fact, there was no one around. It
was eerie.
We drove into our property, past the fire engines parked on Woodpecker Ridge. A helicopter was still taking
water from the pond. Yet there was no sign of active burning -- just the acrid smell of burned wood, and
smoke.
It was strange finding everything on our property the same as when I'd left, when I'd initially decided that
it was going to be burned. There were disturbingly large cinders scattered around, and a fine layer of ash
floated on the pool. The inside of our house smelled like a BBQ shack. But other than that, you wouldn't
know that anything out of the ordinary had happened. Yet the fire had reached to within two properties of
ours.
The smoke was still bad enough, and the helicopter activity busy enough, that we considered using our hotel
room after all. It just didn't feel safe being here with that going on. But I'd been so stressed for two
days that I passed out in bed for several hours. By the time I awoke, some fog was coming in from the coast
and making it easier to breath ( How firefighters can breathe that muck I don't know. Even my very limited
exposure has me coughing still. Thank you again, firefighters!). The helicopters stopped working for the
night. The fire engines left, which we decided was a good sign. So we stayed at home, trusting that our
side of the fire was fully contained.
We have been mowing and clearing our already mowed and cleared property ever since we came home. I've
decided to get rid of a lot of the stuff that I'd already given up for lost. I've been on the computer a
lot, trying to fill in the information gaps. I've been extremely upset by some of the anti-Bonny Doon
sentiments I've read online (examples: that we are exclusive and anti-development, but expect outsiders to
come in and save us when something like this happens, and that we deserve this for living where we do). I am
worried about the backlash, in the long term, over the Ecological Reserve and questions that were brought up
about brush management there (and shame of The Sentinel and Mercury News for being so one-sided on the
issue). I was upset, during the evacuation, by how little empathy I got from businesses in Santa Cruz (I
experienced much more humane treatment, overall, in Scotts Valley). I was shocked by how poor the public
information system was for this fire -- and how incomplete the news reporting. This fire has been an
education for me. I do not like all that I have learned -- about this county, about the agencies that serve
it, and about people in general. I wish I had more heartwarming stories to share. Friends and family have
been kind, at least.
If that sounds too cryptic or cranky, let me explain. My nerves were stretched to the breaking point during
the evacuation, and most of the time I felt as if I were banging my head against a wall when it came to
getting information about the fire. The most stressful part, for me, was more than not knowing whether I had
a house and intact property anymore, it was knowing that the information was available if only someone would
share it with me. Each time I was lucky enough to reach the CDF information number (instead of a busy
signal), I was told the same thing -- that the fire had not gone outside of the boundaries of Smith Grade,
Pine Flat, etc., and that there was no information on where the fire line was. Yet there was a firm fire line
over on this side early on. The conflicting information on road access and evacuation orders, and the wildly
fluctuating news reports, just added to my frustration. If someone had said my home was gone, I would have
known how to proceed -- I was prepared for that. But trying to piece facts together on my own was painful.
Not knowing was like being suspended in time (however briefly, thankfully). In an area as small as Bonny
Doon, perhaps more real-time information could be shared directly with residents -- by phone and online,
since people tend to scatter during an evacuation. It would help people make plans.
And then there was the matter of a county agency taking advantage of our situation, but I will spare you all
those details. We had a rough couple of days, emotionally. Glad it's over.
But be assured, we are truly, madly, deeply grateful that our home and property were spared. The mice that
live behind the fireplace are grateful as well (and appeared to have had a party while we were gone). We all
send our thanks to the firefighters, the animal control people who checked for and rescued pets, the Red
Cross volunteers who helped with evacuees, and everyone else who reached out to help other people in this
fire. "Blessings to you all."
There are a few things that I will do differently if I have to do this again. I should have put a note on my
gate saying that all people and pets were evacuated, to save people the trouble of checking, and I should
have tied the gate open. I will check all the windows on my house next time -- one was left open, and that's
why the house was full of smoke. I will turn off the propane line. I will know to pack for a few days
rather than overnight. And we are already making plans to do even more brush clearing on our property, which
is probably true for most people in Bonny Doon now. So perhaps there is some benefit to be found in this.
I have one open question. Shouldn't the public alert siren be activated for situations like this? The
reverse 911 calls went out really late...