Amen to that! I spent many hours in Sedona in my adolescent and young adult years and it makes my heart hurt to see it in flames. Our thoughts are with you and the rest of your co-workers up there doing touring work. We all hope for a fast end to this fire season! Crystal CraftyCrystal (formerly HinkleHouse) -----Original Message----- From: az-geocaching-bounces@listserv.azgeocaching.com [mailto:az-geocaching-bounces@listserv.azgeocaching.com] On Behalf Of Roping The Wind Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2006 2:34 PM To: listserv@azgeocaching.com Subject: Re: [Az-Geocaching] Latest Sedona Fire >From: "Brian Casteel" <> > >Scott, > >How far are you from this one? It doesn't look like Sedona is the >place to be this summer. > >Brian > >Team A.I. Well, it is the place to be... just not right now! I was about 1.8 miles from the fire and the house here is right on the edge of the forest boundary. I am 3 houses down from the sugarloaf rock/trailhead. Had the fire come this way, I would have been evacuated quickly. Fortunately, it went the other way. The fire started on Brins Mesa... just north of Soldiers Pass. Some of you are probably familiar with the Soldiers Pass jeep trail. If you follow that trail/hiking trail up to Soldiers Pass, head north and cross over to the Brins Mesa Trail, you would be right in the area that the fire started in. This cache is the closest cache to where the fire started: GCHBVG. GCHBVG was a really fun cache. I hiked to it from the house one hot afternoon last summer. It was like a 7 mile round trip hike. But a really fun hike. The cache is on the edge of the cliff and I think it might have survived the fire. I watched the fire from atop Sugarloaf Rock and I could see the flames moving along the mesa and the rock ridge near the cache. But it looks like it might have come within 300-500 feet of the cache and not any closer. Anyways, I got back up here to Sedona (after some business back in the valley) on Sunday around noon and there was no fire. The company owner up here called me (he owns this house I live in and lives in another house about a mile away) and said to look out the window. I did and saw all the smoke. It looked really close. Close enough that he asked if there were any hoses around the house! I walked up the street and hiked up Sugarloaf to see where it was and it was actually about 1.8 miles away. There is one neighborhood in between mine and the fire (and lots and lots of thick brush/manzanita). Fortunately, the fire continued to move north. It climbed to the top of Wilson Mountain within a couple of hours. It was very fast moving as the winds that day were blowing 25 mph or so with higher gusts. It appears the fire was started by a campfire at a transient camp. Unbeleivable. There have been fire restrictions in place for the past couple of months. So due to one persons carelessness (dare I say stupidity)... 1000's of acres of prime forest are destroyed, people evacuted from homes, many people who might lose their homes and properties (in Oak Creek Canyon) and many more people will be out of jobs and lost business revenue for the next month or two or until we get rain (due to the forest closure). Hundreds of hot shot crews are putting their own lives in serious risk working 16 hour shifts fighting this fire in very rugged terrain. I have never really been up close with big forest fires before. But I am seeing all the action around town. I have a tremendous amount of respect for those hot shot crews. They are the toughest men and women around! They work 16 hour days (or more) in hot daytime temperatures (in the 90's and even pushing 100 degrees around here lately) and even hotter conditions near the fires. They are wearing nomex fire suits that do not breath. They are lugging around lots of heavy equiptment on their backs. They do this for extremely long periods of time. Those that work the night shifts will then get some much needed rest and sleep.... in a tent during the hot afternoon on the football field of the local high school. They have unbelievable strength and mental and physical abilities. They did a report on them on the news and they showed a local kindergarten class making cookies to give to the hot shot crews. I'm not generally an emotional guy but that news report made me sad and brought a tear or two. Currently, the fire is moving down into Oak Creek Canyon. It has reached hwy 89A. They conducted backburns along Hwy 89A in the canyon and allowed those fires to move up the hill to meet the main fire. This way, there is no fuel to burn and they hope it will keep the fire from jumping across the hwy. If it does, there are many homes and resorts on the east side of the canyon. There are also many home and resorts on the west side of the canyon as well. It is burning just above the Dairy Queen resturuant. The smoke has been very thick in Sedona during the morning hours. But generally very clear during the afternoons. The house smells of smoke. Cant seem to get it out. I can cleary see the fire from the backyard patio... although much farther away than it was on Sunday , when it first started. As for me, the near future is very much in question. We are done flying on Friday morning and cannot operate again until the forest re-opens. All the jeep tour companies, hummer tours, hot air balloon tours, etc are not able to operate. It will not open up again until we can get enough rain to wet the forest and also until weather conditions become more favorable (higher humidities, cooler temperatures). So not sure if I will be hanging around here in Sedona or not. We are hoping the monsoon rain season will make an early arrival. We will likely not see adaquate rain until July 15th or so (we hope!). I cant even go hiking or geocaching, as the forest is 100 percent closed to public access. Sedona will be a ghost town for the near future. As far as Sedona goes otherwise, the town has not been touched by the fire and no structures destroyed here. The red rocks of Sedona will remain as beautiful as always. The pine forest in and around Sedona is still very green and untouched (other than Brins Mesa). The effects of the fire will be clearly visible after it is over in Oak Creek Canyon. Driving thru Oak Creek Canyon is not going to be nearly as scenic as it once was and will take many years to recover. I always enjoy the fall colors in the canyon during the early Fall when taking our passengers back up to their resorts in the canyon. As soon as the rains fall and the forest reopens... Sedona will again be a great place to be! So pray for rain, rain and more rain!!!!!! Scott Team Ropingthewind ____________________________________________________________ Az-Geocaching mailing list listserv@azgeocaching.com To edit your setting, subscribe or unsubscribe visit: http://listserv.azgeocaching.com/mailman/listinfo/az-geocaching Arizona's Geocaching Resource http://www.azgeocaching.com