Santa Barbara County Trails and Mountain Canyons

From this ridge-top road above Santa Barbara, you can see Los Padres National Forest, a panoramic view of the Santa Barbara coast, the Tea Fire burn area, and Gibraltar Dam.

See Santa Barbara County real-time rainfall totals.

By May 9, the Jesusita Fire had burned more than 8,000 acres and damaged or destroyed more than 90 properties.

I had a wonderful early spring hike up Rattlesnake Canyon Trail. It left me feeling uplifted to see the new growth after the gentle, nicely spaced rains that winter. I had worried about how the canyons would look after the fire, but Rattlesnake was just as wonderful, perhaps even more so because I could witness the miraculous recovery.

The Santa Ynez Mountains grow more and more dear to me. They are a delight and wonder, yet the devastating effects of fire also make them a source of bewilderment and unease. How will the oaks, sages, ceanothus, artemisia, manzanita, other chaparral natives, streams, and canyons return?

Hikes over the years have included observations of charred remains from fires long past. The Zaca Fire of 2007, the Gap Fire of July 2008, and the Tea Fire of November 2008 all awaited the return of mountain plants. Some fresh growth could be seen returning, but the landscape still left me shaken.

Our delicate mountains, not quite desert and not quite forest, left me wondering how long it would take for them to regain their splendor. Mountains, like people and communities, go through devastating times, and it is only human to fear that the devastation will last while waiting for growth and renewal.

Yet the string of desire leads to a belief that we can find harmony with what is good and true: a place with life-giving streams, creeks, and rivers where trees and plants nurture generations to come. I have grown to love the mountains because they are such a source of bounty that one learns to love and understand life by knowing them.

December 14, 2008

These photographs were taken while riding in a car on the freeway. It was a very dry year and a warm summer, so the mountains were ripe for fires. The mountains above Goleta had the Gap Fire in July, and the mountains above Santa Barbara had the Tea Fire in November.