With the fires finally getting contained, we can start to breathe the air again and assess the effects of the fire. After talking it over with Chik and Elijah during our Aliso Creek ride this past Saturday, I decided to try and do an overlay of our STT ride just before the fires with the areas that were burned.
It looks like most of the trail was burned all along the ridge. But if you look closely, it seems that Flagpole, a famous trail landmark, may actually be outside the burned area. But we’ll have to wait to see if that is really the case. You can try and find it on the right-most part of the loop. This is normally the spot that we meet up after the long climb up the ridge.
While we were riding Aliso Creek this past weekend, we could still see smoke rising from the remaining fires in Silverado Canyon and also on the backside of Saddleback Mountain. Fortunately, the temperatures have cooled down and there was even a little bit of rain in the afternoon, so it looks like this fire season is coming to an end.