Friday, July 13 was my birthday. To celebrate, my boyfriend, Bob, and I went to the coast. It was great to get out of the Klamath River Valley for a few days. I had a great time, bought a bunch of stuff, won money at a casino that gave me play money for my birthday, and slept overnight in a motel.

When we returned on Saturday night at 11:30pm we were appalled to see a bright red mass of forest fire flames on the hill right next to the forested hill I live on. When we left on Friday, that wasn’t there. The lightning that started all the fires hit the Wednesday before. There are dozens of fires burning all through this forest, but this particular fire ignited two days later and came way too close to our little town of Happy Camp.

So my last few days have been occupied with packing for evacuation, storing valuables elsewhere, attending community fire information meetings, writing articles about the fires for Happy Camp News, being elated when it rained heavily on Tuesday night, and in general, feeling like I was misplaced.

Here’s something you never want to see happening less than a mile from your home. This is what it looked like last Tuesday. We had a lot of people praying for us and God sent rain on Tuesday night. Now there are only a few white wisps of smoke coming up in various places from the forest. I pray it doesn’t get this bad again before they get the entire fire under control. The fire is called the Little Grider Fire after Little Grider Creek, a creek that runs a mile southwest of here. The fire was between our town and the creek.

The map shows how close this fire got to my house.

I’ve been going to work every day. Yesterday at the pizza place where I work we were inundated by hungry fire fighters. I guess they had the day off because of the rain the night before. Guess what. Fire fighters like pizza. They kept us busy from noon to closing time, 9pm. Actually I heard that the night shift stayed open an extra hour to accommodate the famished. Seemed like almost everyone wanted their own personal sized mini pizzas, and we probably sold over a hundred, whereas we usually sell less than five of those in a day.

The good news is that the fire moved away from town and it looks like I won’t have to evacuate after all.

I’ll get back on my schedule again soon - I didn’t even have my computer in my home for a few days so I couldn’t do any blogging at all. For now I’ll file this with my thankfulness articles because I’m so grateful my house didn’t burn down.

Bob and I are heading out for our daily fire watch time. We go across the river every day to get a good look at fire suppression helicopters and to see where the smoke is coming from. See ya later!

[Update: since I wrote this I created a Squidoo lens on evacuation planning: Emergency Survival - Plan and Prepare NOW so if Something Terrible Happens, You'll Be Ready!.]

Yesterday I had the best massage I’ve ever had. It happened in a creek north of here.

We went to our regular swimming hole in Indian Creek, and it was too crowded due to all the hot bikers from our Happy Camp River Run. They probably remembered the place from last year. So then we went upstream to a place where my boyfriend, Bob, has been panning for gold - and someone else was already there. Next we went to the swimming hole upstream at South Fork - and I’ve never seen so many people in that location. It was like a major attraction.

Did I mention how hot it was? Major swimming hole weather.

So we crossed the bridge at South Fork and noticed a little waterfall on the north side of the creek.

Let me tell you, that waterfall gave me the best massage I’ve ever had. It pounded on my back and shoulder muscles relentlessly. I’ve had a sore neck for several years - seems like I never get total relief. The Reiki I learned has been a big help, but sooner or later the soreness comes back.

Well, yesterday’s waterfall massage was incredible. I could still feel the source of the pain deep inside but could position my neck under the water to get pounded right there where it hurt. It felt so good! And today, still no more ache in the neck.

Something else - last night I got nine hours sleep… for which I am very grateful because usually I wake up after five hours and can’t get back to sleep. I believe my wonderful ability to sleep nine hours was due to relaxation, plus stress and tension relief that I got from being under that waterfall yesterday.

The rest of that area was incredible, like a jacuzzi, all bubbly water - frothy - sensational. Bob and I loved it and we’re going back. This time we’re taking pictures, and I’ll post one here.

One tiny drawback - there was a snake that kept trying to climb up the rock, then kept getting knocked back down by the rush of the waterfall, into our little jacuzzi area. Eventually Bob encouraged the little thing to get swept downstream into more peaceful water where he might get a bite to eat somewhere.

I thought it was cool that such a healing place would be visited by a snake, which is an ancient symbol of healing. I realize many of you wouldn’t care for it - and I admit I hugged the other side of the pond once we knew he was there - but I appreciated the symbolism.

So today my Sunday thankfulness is for the best massage I’ve ever had, the waterfall that gave it to me, and my sweet boyfriend who took me there.

P.S. We’ve decided to start a new blog: Swimming Holes - it will start with our accounts of swimming holes in Northern California and Southern Oregon - but we’ll want to publish information about other swimming holes from people in other areas.

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Follow-up note: We went there again today, this time with a camera. Here’s a photo of Bob under the waterfall:

Because of all the frothy bubbles caught there between the rocks, I named this place Laughing Waters Natural Spa. There’s a rock to sit on right under the center of the waterfall as it massages your back. Also you can hang onto a couple of rocks underwater and let the rest of your body float; it makes for an interesting leg massage.

This time Bob had his mask and snorkel. He found a lot of baby salmon underwater and let me look at them. The have their own little swimming hole, a bit down from the falls, right before the rocks in the foreground of this picture.