So I was getting ready to write a “things will not be very exciting (for us yes, but for you to read about, no) in the next few weeks so I will skip writing for a bit)….then….

We had been in Colorado about 2 1/2 weeks and were heading down the canyon on Friday, July 8 to run some errands then head to a soft opening of The Rayback Collective, Alana’s new workplace, a bar/event space/food truck heaven. Janice and I were driving in one car and I looked over at the mountain on the far side of the reservoir and saw black smoke. “That can’t be good” I remember saying.

When we got down the mountain, Buzz texted me and said there was a wild fire. After a fun evening at The Rayback Collective, we headed back up the “hill” and saw all kinds of emergency vehicles and fire trucks heading back down. We figured the fire was out and went to bed thinking that thought. Saturday morning, one of us looked on the web and saw that the wild fire was still burning and growing! A trip to the grocery store and to the post office brought this sight:

Janice and I stood there for maybe 10 minutes and saw 4 Chinook helicopters load up with water and head just over the hill and return quickly to refill from the reservoir. (sorry the video quality is not great: it was so sunny that day I had a hard time seeing what I was filming…kind of the opposite weather us Easterner’s associate with disaster weather.)

So when we headed home we really started following the Boulder Office of Emergency Management Twitters….believe it or not, Twitter was the most accurate and up-to-date information. The mandatory evacuation areas began to expand. Pre-evacuation areas were put up on Sunday that included Janice’s sister and came within a 1/2 mile of Kyle and Janice’s house. I was starting to feel a little concerned…it is kind of like waiting for a big snow storm to start but in that instance you usually know you may be stuck inside your house for a couple days but you are IN YOUR HOUSE. Here they are telling you that you have to leave and you don’t know if your house will still be there when you get back! A pretty unsettling feeling.

But regular life continued…we continued to work on the front deck and gardens. But we started to make a plan: what we would grab if we had to evacuate. Kyle loaded the 4X4 on the trailer along with their bikes, gas cans, etc. He called a friend to see if they could ride their motorcycles over to their place and store them there. We talked about where we would go….to Nicholas’, of course. But wait, towards Boulder is one of the directions they were afraid the fire might go. So Kyle suggested we go to his store in Golden; we could bring camping gear and sleep in the store. Then I suggested we head to Black Hawk and rent a suite in one of the casinos…might as well flee in style! Sunday night we were on hold…by late Sunday night they had lifted the pre-evac order for near the house. But then Janice’s sister and brother-in-law got evacuated (this is the place we dog sat last Christmas) so they brought the dogs over here. So then the joke became that we might have to check in to the hotel with 4 people, 4 dogs, a cat, and 8 chickens!!

Unfortunately the fire moved up the scale to become a federal problem but that enabled more resources such as Hot Shot teams from Wyoming and Arizona, more planes, more firefighters on the front line. They did a tremendous job in keeping the fire from spreading during a hot day with 35 mph winds. Hot sparks did jump Boulder Canyon Road but they were able to get those out quickly. When they finally opened the Canyon and we drove it on Thursday, the trees were singed right down to the road…so close to jumping the canyon which would have been a whole other horrifying story.

The above photos were taken at the back of the fire heading over toward Estes Park. If you look closely, you can see some streaks of red which is the slurry the planes dump to smother the fire.

Nederland pulled together to help raise funds for those 8 families who lost their homes. Amazingly no lives were lost. The one firefighter who lost his house was reunited with his dog to help ease the sorrow. Hand painted thank you signs popped up all over town; free ice cream for firefighters at the ice cream shop. Donations of goods and volunteers came pouring in.

We figured this was just another fire for Kyle and Janice and Nederland but we were informed that this was the closest a wildfire had come in recent history. So grateful that it was a happy ending for most people…except hopefully not for the bozos from Alabama who did not put out their campfire properly while trespassing on private property and started the fire.