LAKE ARROWHEAD – While mudslides and debris flows from Hilary damaged at least two bridges and some homes in the hills of San Bernardino County, mountain residents near Lake Arrowhead appeared to emerge relatively unscathed.
“Oh, it’s great here,” said Bruce Cardwell. “It’s the best place to live in Southern California. We’re 20 degrees cooler than anywhere else.”
At about 4,000 feet elevation, with steep, wooded slopes in every direction, Arrowhead Tree Top Lodge sits atop a confluence of small waterways.
“From the 173 here you have the storm runoff coming down here,” Cardwell said of the property’s drainage. “And come in here, and go here in our stream.”
So on the other side of the mountain, people like Bruce Cardwelll spent the last few hours before the storm checking every possible trouble spot – unsure of what was to come.
“We made sure to clean all our drains and everything,” he said. “So that we were prepared for it.”
And as night fell, the storm also increased in intensity as it pushed against the mountains, bringing with it tremendous rain and wind.
Most of the weather didn’t hit the highlands until late Sunday evening. There was a lot of discussion about whether this would look like what they are used to in this area.
The area gets a lot of rain and the place is built to move water. But residents weren’t sure if it would work the way they’re used to seeing it or if it would turn out to be something else.
“I have seen such rain and in other parts of the country. Never here,’ Nathan Godwin said.
Godwin is the general manager of Lake Gregory, which has jumped several feet in a matter of hours.
“We were five feet high yesterday,” Godwin explained. “We’re at four feet now. So normally we drive around this edge of the lake.”
The edge of the lake is now littered with everything that has flown downhill overnight, but the storm drains have done their job.
There were no major problems, just some cleaning up after a night of very atypical weather.
“We’ve done pretty well,” he said.
In fact, the grocery store for this community collapsed under the weight of the massive snowfall in March. So a remarkable weather year was now interrupted by a tropical system in which fire risk is the usual concern.
Wilson Walker
