Mahala: The Golden Tree / Ring of Fire

It was another gorgeous and warm early November day. We had plans to go to town, but my husband's car wouldn't start. So we jumped his car with my car, and then he took me over to the other end of town and dropped me off, so I could do the Mahala walk back home through the Scotia Barrens.

The foliage colors are pretty much done in the Barrens, and the leaves are mostly brown and crispy under foot now, but I did find one really beautiful golden tree, which you may see above!

When I got home from my walk, we took his car into town for Nardone's and Pop Tarts. ;-) I needed easy cheesy pizza (available at Weis) and he wanted to rack up some more gas points (Giant). Then he filled up the car and a couple of gas cans, filling up for $51.50, and saving $52.50 on gas. That's a square deal! Yay, Pop Tarts for extra gas points!

On the way home, around 1 p.m., I saw smoke above Tow Hill. "It looks like Tow Hill is on fire," I said. But I chalked it up to somebody burning leaves. People get so worked up over a bunch of leaves around here. They spend their weekends blowing, mowing, and carrying on; yes, even burning them. Here's a big secret, folks: if you leave them lie long enough, they turn into DIRT. Yeah, regular dirt!

But as it turns out, it was not just someone burning leaves, as we discovered when the fire trucks began to arrive on our road as it was getting ready to get dark. Truck after truck after truck! Lights and sirens flashing! Making a ruckus! Up Tow Hill Road! Several counties worth of fire trucks!

I listened to the scanner as a calm, cool, and collected dude instructed others where to go, what to do. I thought I heard him say at one point that he had two miles of fire, all the way down to the beaver ponds on the bottom, and over to Gatesburg. It sounded like it was HIS fire. Nothing like taking ownership of a problem! Wow, man. Color me . . . impressed.

At one point, they were fighting the flames with ATVs on Uni Road, which is *gulp* about a quarter-mile from our home. I relayed details to my Facebook friends, comment by comment. This is Howard Cosell: TOW HILL IS BURNING!!! 

And they wrote back. Was I okay? Were we evacuating? And advice: wet down the perimeter with the hose. Douse the house! Love and concern poured out of the Internet, as the local firefighters fought our blaze.

I watched the neighborhood Facebook page with great interest, as details and photos emerged. By 8 p.m. or so, someone posted a photo of the first responders taking a break, getting health checks, eating pizza. I have no idea how many acres were burned (and yes, fire IS a natural part of managing a pine barrens ecosystem, but what about all those houses?), but the Tow Hill side of the fire was contained before bed, hooray!

So we are okay now, and as far as I know, the fire has been managed and contained. My husband and I are concerned about what our beloved Barrens will look like, but that will be an adventure of discovery for some other day. In the meantime, this is my soundtrack song: Home Free, with Ring of Fire.