The brick house across the street, which still stood, hosts the annual block party to raise fire awareness, an event that is not held until June. "I guess we should have had it a little bit earlier this year," Ellison said.
At roadblocks leading up to still officially closed Mission Canyon, residents negotiated, argued and pleaded with law enforcement officers to let them by to get a glimpse of their homes. Some biked or hiked in.
Cmdr. Darin Fotheringham of the county Sheriff's Department said officials were "evaluating hour by hour" when the rest of the evacuees could return home. "We do ask for the public's patience in this endeavor," he said.
Mike Schlagel, 57, parked his car and took a mountain bike up to property he owns on Montrose Place. He found the main house, which he rents out, intact and a two-car garage he used for an office and storage ruined. Among the treasures he lost -- a chest that held baby pictures of his now-college-age daughter.
He estimated the damage at $50,000 but noted calmly that his "renters will be pleased" the house survived.
In the mountains northeast of Santa Barbara, crews continued to do battle.
Joseph Rubio surveyed a bleak landscape of smoldering hot spots and skeletal manzanita jutting up from gray ash. "Thursday afternoon and night up here was crazy," he said, shaking his head. "We were cutting fire lines alongside 60-foot flames. Homes were burning up in howling winds. Mules were running around loose."
Rubio, 50, was one of two dozen inmate volunteers from the Fennel Canyon Conservation Camp near Palmdale. Armed with shovels, cutting tools and all the water they could carry, the crew was among dozens working on narrow ridgelines and almost-vertical slopes to stamp out the last remaining hot spots.
It was hot, sweaty and tedious work. Still, it was "nothing like what we had to deal with a few days ago," said Capt. Matt Edmiston of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, who was in charge of Rubio's crew. "We arrived up here at 2 a.m. on Wednesday, and after that it was 50-mile-per-hour sundowner wind conditions and red flag warnings every afternoon."
Pointing his shovel toward a flare-up, he added: "We're not out of the woods yet. Not by a long shot."
Some residents wept with joy and expressed gratitude to the firefighters. Glenn Miller was moved to tears as he reflected on how his home in San Roque Canyon had been saved.
