Wildfire returns

A disturbed night with a hot wind brewing up again. Not the best conditions for Clare to recover from her journey. We walked down to Carrefour to stock up on veggies late morning, and caught a convenient air conditions bus to Beverly Hill to avoid carrying the shopping in the midday heat. Most of the afternoon we siesta'd. But I did take some time to record and edit next week's Morning Prayer upload. It's good to have this ready so soon.

Just after five we heard sirens, one after the other. Fire somewhere or other. When we went down stairs to look, we could see a plume of smoke, driven by the south west wind. West of the A7 motorway is a wooded ridge which gives way into a broad valley beneath the Sierra Bermeja. There are villages, farms urbanizaciones and even the municipal crematorium up beyond the ridge. The flames came up to the edge of the ridge and were visible a mile away from the house. 

The fire command helicopter was in the air surveying the scene within ten minutes of hearing the sirens, and five minutes later the first of the two water bombing helicopters was circling the fire ground and presumably figuring how to tackle the blaze in coordination with ground crews, already on the scene, to judge by the white clouds of steam appearing in the wake of the brown and black clouds of smoke from burning trees and grass. The helicopters must have used the golf course lake water source again, as their water bombing runs over the next hour and a half were amazingly frequent, every couple of minutes. Just after seven, the sky cleared and by eight the A7 was open to traffic again. A superbly executed operation. Three hours this time, as opposed to four last month.

Patricia's sons live the other side of the hill. I called her about the fire, just at she was noticing the clouds of smoke in the sky. She told me later that both f then had called her to ask if she was OK. They knew what was happening but it wasn't affecting them as they feared it might be affecting her. It's one of those things. In a huge landscape fire can devastate one area and miss another altogether, depending on the wind, and geography.

The latest occupants of the house next door were out taking photos. One of them had a drone fitted with a camera and showed us pictures of the fire front at an early stage. The mother had noticed the smoke at around five and called the fire brigade from the swimming pool, she told Clare. The family had driven down from Bordeaux, about 4000km for their holiday. They know all about forest fires up there. We spoke in French, with Spanish vocabulary interfering when I got excited.

Before supper we walked down to the beach and along the senda litoral, along the unpleasant footpath which crosses the rio Guadalbon right next to the A7 roundabout. At that moment police cars blocked the exits, unless you wanted to go west down the coast. The eastbound carriageways were sill closed due to smoke, and cars were banned from trying to take a short cut through Estepona to circumvent the afflicted area. Lots of unhappy motorists around tonight!

As it's been windy all day, the beach was empty and few people were out for their paseo. When we got back we shared a swordfish steak and veggies for supper. Clare the sat on the lounger on the bedroom balcony, enjoying the sunset and the cooler breeze, after a dramatic afternoon to remember,

My photos from this afternoon and the previous wildfire across the valluy are all here. They serve as a reminder of how it's going to be in Britain more frequently in years to come. I hope our helicopter crews will be just as skilled and disciplined in tackling this frightful danger which moves faster than anyone can run.