Mom came down the weekend before last to have a look at what is left of
her home. There wasn’t really much to show her (of what was left). The
whole interior suffered damage – the city fire investigator called it
90% uninhabitable, which I suppose means we could camp out in the garage
if it had plumbing! She was very taken aback, seeing it for herself.
One just can’t realize the whole scope of the mess from looking at
photographs; it certainly makes it ‘real’ seeing it in person.
Our condo board has finally started the ball rolling to get us our house
back. The association’s insurance is responsible for rebuilding the
structure (our insurance covers the paint ‘in’) so they’ve started
asking for contractor’s bids on the project. Then the bids have to be
analyzed, a contractor chosen, engineering & architectural plans
drawn up, city permitting obtained, all before any work can actually
begin. I think we’re looking at at least two months before “the first
nail is hammered”, as my uncle says. Then many, many more months before
we can move back in.
In the meantime I’ve been scouring over our damage & loss estimate,
querying the insurance company on different items; arranged for a
Cleaning & Restoration company to come and remove everything from
our garage for cleaning, “de-smoking”, and storage; and we’ve found a
rental condo and signed a lease for October to January so at least we’ll
have somewhere to live this fall.
that’s Coachella Valley in the distance
The group hiking is minimal here due to the heat and the lack of hike
leaders. Although pre-dawn temperatures are lovely, it warms up very
quickly once the sun rise. It’s been pretty consistently in the high
90’s – 105F the last couple of weeks, so I’ve only hiked 4x so far – all
at higher elevations such as Idyllwild and Mt. San Jacinto. This past
Wednesday an informal group of 7 of us climbed from the aerial tramway
on Mt. San Jacinto up to it’s peak: 8 miles and 2300′ elevation.
Normally it’s about 11miles but our leader decided the direct, off-trail
route would be shorter and more challenging! Technically it shouldn’t
have been hard but the thinner air at 10,000′ sure gets the lungs
a-pumping. I’m going to give it another try tomorrow, but we’re
sticking to the path this time!
Allison’s Wanderlust 
