Fire, fire everywhere! Thursday Evening

Four major wildfires are buring in southern California. Hemet, Azusa, Rancho Palos Verdes, La Canada Flintridge are all getting smoke in their eyes, several homes lost, more threatened. Most of the fires began yesterday. The Station fire (La Canada), burning in the Angeles National Forest is picking up in intensity and spreading fast. We went out driving around tonight to check it out because you can see the flames from around where we live. It is not too close to us, but the flames are high and what a sight to see when I was driving home from the barn tonight. They announced that 500 acres had already burned in the Station Fire and that five buildings and 500 homes were possibly at risk, evacuations have begun. We were not the only ones out tonight checking it out, there was a full parking lot at a lookout with a view of the fire. People even brought chairs to sit watch the flames!

We stopped for some gelato at Bulgarini Gelato in Altadena on the way home from checking out the fire. I get the small size. You pick three flavors and get scoops the size of a melon baller - perect size for me and I love trying different flavors. My choices tonight were Hazelnut, Goat Milk with cocoa beans, and Yogurt with Olive Oil. Very unusual flavors, but all very delicious. Hazelnut - Ground hazelnuts studded throughout the creamiest base. The goat's milk is rich and pleasantly tangy. The yogurt with Olive Oil was tart and delicious, a traditional Roman flavor. Sounds weird, but it was really good! Can't get too sick of any of the flavors because there is only about two bites of each.

I cannot figure out how to take night shots on my camera, but this was a view of the La Canada Fire overlooking the JET Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).

View out my car window on the way home.

The Morris Fire (Azusa), the one near the barn, has scorched more than 2000 acres and is only about 60 percent contained. It is not threatening the barn anymore, it is burning in the other direction. There is still no electricity at the barn, but they have a generator running, so at least the automatic waterers are working. The road to the barn remains closed based on the status of the Morris Dam fire, but the highway patrol officers have been very nice and let me through every night. The entrance to the ranch is not too far past the road block they have set up and now they recognize me and don't ask too many questions.


The horses got a beauty session tonight but no riding. Besides that fact that it was 100 degrees at 6pm, I was worried about the air quality.