I know this is more of a chaff like post but I believe it should reach members that don’t venture over there.
First of all we want to thank all of you that have supported us through this ordeal, with money, with offers for temporary housing and with kind words. Thank you!
Thank you Ryan for everything you have done, really.
Thank you Doug, for so much.
I have read every post and plan on replying to them not too far into the future.
As of yesterday and more so today, it’s looking like the fires are under control and we are no longer in danger of losing Chris’ shop at the farm/ranch. We have gotten two decent nights of sleep now, if a bit jumpy but that will take a while.
Chris has a small trailer/office inside one of the barns and we slept there the last two nights, on a comfortable bed no less :)
We have been running around 18 hours a day, cutting trees, dozing around buildings, setting up generators, fixing neighboring farms generators and other equipment, moving equipment to help Calfire etc. Thankfully we each have a paper signed by a Calfire chief, designating us as critical workers so we are able to make it trough the closures, which have gotten pretty intense; owning a home or a farm is not enough to get one in.
Chris’s truck has been powering the ranch this whole week. Today we went to Treasure island and picked up another 30KW generator that we will plumb in the next day or two. Our first purchase since this ordeal.
Our plan for the near future is to get this place functioning and safe again, for us and for others that are farming and working here; we won’t be looking for housing for a while as this place is central both for our community and for our ability to recover from all this. When things come back to some normalcy, and we don’t know what that will look like, we hope to find something nearby.
Our kids are ok, a bit spread out, but we have been able to keep in touch at least for basic things.
Our stretch of coast is looking a bit like a war zone and it’s been feeling like one too. I still have not made it back to the site of our home; those pictures were taken by Libby. I would like to make it up there soon ; it will be hard as I already ache for it but I need some sense of closure. We know many, many people that have lost their homes as well; this is a shared hardship. Like us many of our friends are out helping their neighbors and making sure that there is a sense of strength and of moving forward.
This community has done a lot for us. Thank you. We will do all we can to be of help to our community here on the coast. As I wrote on my IG account…“we are not broken, just a bit banged up”. Thanks for helping us out.
