California is on fire

California had some interesting weather last Saturday. A lightning storm moved over much of the state. Today, there are still 1,088 fires burning in California. In our area, there are 12 fires. The closest is at 2,200 acres (the Oliver fire).

A couple nights ago, you could see it from the top of our road. Lilli wanted to do something to help the firefighters. So today we took cold water and home-made cookies out to the fire line. We have met firefighters from all over California, and also got to watch the big choppers filling up from a pond.




In the meantime, the smoke in the air is really bad. There's a visible haze, and it's difficult to see the hills just ten miles away. The sun is a brilliant red when it sets. The air quality is the worst it has ever been up here. But we count ourselves lucky - we are not among the 200 threatened homes, and we did not have to evacuate. Let's just hope that the thunderstorms predicted for the weekend don't materialize!