It’s been nearly four years since the CZU Lightning Complex Fire raged through the Santa Cruz Mountains, destroying 911 homes, devastating Big Basin Redwoods State Park and blackening 86,500 acres — an area three times the size of San Francisco — in San Mateo and Santa Cruz counties.
But Carrie Herrera still vividly remembers how she felt as the massive flames appeared on a nearby ridge, threatening the camp she runs near La Honda.
“The smoke was horrendous,” she said. “You couldn’t even see in front of you. It was hard to breathe. Your jacket and hair were covered with ash. You smelled like a bonfire. It was very ominous.” As the executive director of the YMCA’s Camp Jones Gulch, a beloved 928-acre wooded property that has hosted children since the 1930s, Herrera was overjoyed when the camp survived.