Turns out that the hike we did a couple of months back in Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park was smack in the path of the large wildfire burning south of Big Sur. According to the San Jose Mercury News, the fire has closed the cove, burned right up to the Ventana Inn and torched the hillside across from the Nepenthe. There's now also a risk that this fire will link up with the Indian fire burning to the south. Combined, these blazes would span 68,500 acres, itself a sizeable percentage of the over 300,000 acres burned or burning in California over the past few weeks, caused in the large part by dry lightening strikes last weekend.
Thanks to all the associated smoke, air quality has been very poor over the past week or so but for us at least the strengthening breeze off the ocean is starting to clear things out. The only consolation has been some beautiful sunrises and sunsets thanks to all the smoke/fog/smog in the air, especially first thing in the morning.
There's supposed to be a risk of more electrical storms this weekend so we may yet still have even more to contend with. Fire-fighting resources are completely overwhelmed even with help from the National Guard. Oh, and in some places in the state they are still selling fireworks for the upcoming July 4th celebrations, which of course makes perfect sense ....
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