Kirk C. Watkins and Bethany Holt-Watkins, Peak to Peak. At 12:37 p.m. on October 18, 2020, a message went out on the Bar-K QT, an online community posting board that connects the residents of the Bar-K subdivision located at the Northern end of the Peak to Peak highway. 

The post read simply, “1 acre fire at CalWood - response in progress.” 

As emergency response teams kicked into action, the volunteer fire department from Jamestown, along with the Lefthand Fire Department and various other units responded as quickly as they could. The road to CalWood itself is a windy, narrow, dirt road the responders had to take trying to get ahead of the fire before it was rendered out of control due to the dry, gusty winds that have been pummeling the area. The combination of drought conditions and strong gusty winds caused the CalWood fire to suddenly explode between October 18 and October 19. The CalWood fire spread quickly Northeast, jumped over Highway 36 and overwhelmed the Lake of the Pines subdivision along highway 36.

The fire season in 2020 has been a particularly brutal season. The Cameron Peak fire, along with a number of other fires, have put a strain on the hard-fighting firefighters locally and across the Western states. Resources were strained again when another fire started at the 14000 block of Lefthand Canyon near Ward. A new round of evacuation was initiated.

In Nederland, the Boulder Creek Lodge met evacuees from the CalWood fire with open arms, on the night of the 17^th. Although they had not been officially established as a Red Cross evacuation location, they processed whoever came for shelter with a promise of a fair price if the Red Cross did not provide support. As one of the few open locations on the Peak to Peak, the Red Cross started sending first responders and evacuees there on the 18^th from the Lefthand fire.

A processing center was opened up at the Nederland Community Center to help the evacuees. Channel 9 news and Channel 31 news were both onsite at the community center to cover the fires. The reporter for Channel 9 said that he had never seen anything like these events before, and the cameraman for Channel 31 was emotional as he set up for his T.V. broadcast. Local residents Tad Miller and his daughter, Clementine, had left work at the Carousel of Happiness to direct cars to the Community Center from the highway. 

“We’re going to open up the parking lot and the community center, and do what we have to do,” he said, “it’s a strange sensation, but man, it’s awful dry.”

For up to date information, https://boco.org/OEMInfoMap  or https://www.boulderoem.com/emergency-status/