(Photo: Neighbors search through the rubble of their burned out houses on Lancashire Way in Rancho Bernardo. Rene Gutel/KJZZ )
San Diegans used the weekend to regroup after their disastrous week of fires. Reporter Rene Gutel spent Saturday and Sunday talking to people as they began to put their lives back in order.
Sunday morning in Spring Valley, hundreds of worshippers gathered at the evangelical Skyline Church.
The Harris Fire threatened many of these congregants, destroying 206 homes in the outlying community, and killing five people. Outreach Pastor Nicole Renaud urged volunteers to answer the call.
Renaud: In times like this, this is a real test of our faith. It causes a lot of people to go outside of their comforts zones and to really actually apply what they believe.
After the service, Tammy Wilbur enrolled in a one-hour training class for the church's emergency response teams. Wilbur was bracing herself for the unexpected in the days ahead.
Wilbur: I'll be taking my kids with me, and we'll be ministering, whatever. If that's handing out clothes, or water or cleaning up messes, in the name of Jesus, we'll do whatever, whatever the dirty work is and whatever it means.
All across San Diego County - both Saturday and Sunday - families were already getting dirty and cleaning up messes. In one of the hardest hit communities, Rancho Bernardo, Tony Heinrichs stood on a pile of ash and burned metal.
Heinrichs: This was my home, yes, 18634 Lancashire Way.
Friends sifted through the rubble, looking for anything recognizable. If something familiar was spotted, it ended up on a blanket, on Heinrich's front lawn.
Heinrich: I found my navy sword, I'm a retired naval officer, so I found that. Just odds and ends, I found my college class ring, it's nice to be able to find anything. I wasn't expecting to find anything, to be honest with you."
Half the homes on this street were destroyed. The clean-up will be a massive undertaking. Despite the grim task, Heinrich's mood was upbeat.
Heinrich: You can always replace stuff, you can always build a new house and I'm just grateful that my wife and our pet kitten and I got alive. We had maybe 5-8 minutes to get out, and we're grateful to God that we were able to get out with our lives.
While Heinrichs counted his blessings, firefighters in far flung corners of the county were still trying to save other homes. Crews made headway on the massive Witch and Harris Fires, and the Rice and Horno Fires were brought under full containment. Saturday's weather lent a hand. Light rains were reported throughout San Diego, including at the Home Depot in Carmel Valley.
The home improvement store was busy. In the parking lot, Paul Thoryk had a tear in his eye as he loaded his truck with the tools needed to start cleaning up his property.
Thoryk: As you can see, these are all irrigation supplies, chain saws to chop off the burnt trees, a lot of stuff…
Thoryk said he'd fought for three years for the rights to build on his land, which overlooks the Wild Animal Park. He designs homes for a living, and was working on his own, so the loss was especially poignant.
Thoryk: Well, yeah it was beautiful, like a botanical garden…
What made it worse, he said, was that he didn't have insurance.
Thoryk: It's a huge loss, it's a lot of money.
Across the parking lot, Forest Ranch resident Bijan Arbab said he was spending the weekend working around the house.
Arbab: Just cleaning a lot of ashes, from the outside to the inside, changing air filters, making sure the house is all okay, and cleaning and washing the windows - hoping for rain, and then trying to get back to normal and get back to work.
Getting back to the day job may be the easy part. The real work of re-building has only begun.
For KPBS, I'm Rene Gutel.
