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We were thinking of moving to Julian, because it's cooler. It's a beautiful place, very famous for apple pie and little shops.

The Community Plan Area of Julian is located between Volcan Mountain and the Cuyamaca Mountains. State Highway 78 serves as Julian's Main Street and a principle travel route to the desert from metropolitan San Diego which lies 60 miles to the west. The Kumeyaay, the first inhabitants, lived in small, seasonal villages scattered throughout the area to avoid the desert heat of summer. The discovery of gold in late 1860s brought gold-rush fame to these mountains and settlers to the newly-created town of Julian. In 1870, Julian's population was 300 with nearly 1500 people living in the Julian Mining District. However, the rush was short-lived and during the 1880s most of the mines closed. The population of Julian dropped to 100. Although several brief periods of mining revived interest in gold exploration, overall, mining had become too expensive to remain the mainstay of Julian's economy. Mining activities gave way to a variety of business efforts such as brick-making, lumbering, orchard agriculture and grazing. It was also at this time that visitors were drawn to the area by its beauty and Julian became known as a resort as well as a gold-rush town. Population in the Planning Area is approximately 2,800 today and is expected to reach nearly 4000 by the year 2005. When the first Community Plan was prepared in 1976, 1500 people lived in and around Julian. Increases in population have come slowly

From an email sent to me by a friend at BART:

I heard this story this morning on the KFOG morning show. A man was
visiting his daughter in the San Bernardino Mountains. They were not yet
required to evacuate, but the fire was moving towards the daughter's home.
They decided to take action. They drove to a nearby store and bought some
chemicals, a pump and some hoses. The daughter has a swimming pool. Their
intent was to hose everything down and also put fire retardant chemicals on
everything that would burn.

When they returned to her neighborhood, the police had barricaded the road
and would not let them in. They snuck around on a nearby trail, carrying
their stuff up the hill behind the houses. Once they got set up, they
banded together with the neighbors on both sides of her house, who had not
evacuated. Together, this team saved 6 homes from the fire, while
everything else in the area burned down.

Afterwards, they were laying in the yard exhausted. The police came and
arrested them because they were not supposed to be there. And now the best
part of the story: The homeowners' insurance company bailed them out!

Thanks for the info! It was a nice place to walk around.Before getting a hitch to Julian my wife and I had lain in a previously burned area while high winds and heavy rain pelted our tent. After enduring this most of the second day we hiked out to a small picnic area by the Sunrise Highway, and within 45 minutes, a nice older couple (I think from Escondido) took us to Julian where we splurged and stayed in the Julian Hotel (I think that's what it was called -- it was a bed and breakfast).

I miss the hike. I felt so free, even though it was cloudless and hot for most of the hike from Campo, save for the aforementioned rainstorm. I never knew such beautiful country existed in SoCal.