Washed Out : Riverwood Ranch: Gushing waters from Big Tujunga Dam strand 30 families Monday. They say it’s a price they’re willing to pay for a rural lifestyle.

For most of the year, the name Riverwood Ranch is something of a misnomer.

Riverwood’s river is little more than a 100-yard wide swath of gravel and dust--the Big Tujunga Wash. But on those rare days when normally sunny skies unleash torrential rains, the 100 or so residents of this Sunland-Tujunga neighborhood have learned to be prepared.

On Monday, for instance, gushing water unleashed from Big Tujunga Dam upstream rose above the little blacktop bridge along Oro Vista Avenue that is the neighborhood’s only reliable access about 6:30 a.m., stranding the 30 families on their own little island.

Not that they minded.

“It’s all part of living here,” said Jerry Hansen, a 12-year resident who drove down to the water’s edge to videotape the deluge. Across the wash, television crews and newspaper photographers snapped on their big lenses to zoom in on the residents on the other side.

Hansen and others have come to accept these occasional inconveniences as fair swaps for their three-acre ranchettes secluded in steep and winding canyons on the southern fringe of Angeles National Forest.

So when the heavy rains hit, they take the day off from work and stock up on such essentials as toilet paper and bottled water, TV dinners and beer.

“Rumor has it that toilet paper can sell for 20 bucks a roll,” said resident Cas Sermak.

Sermak, a landscaper, moved many of his tools from his house into a storage facility on the other side of the wash so that his employees could work even when he could not.

By historical standards, Monday’s washout was not nearly as severe as others. Dillan Murrey, a 30-year resident, said residents were transported in and out of the neighborhood by helicopter during similar situations in 1969, ‘71, ’78 and ’83.

Last year, the road was shut down for a day.

“Apparently, they’ve been through this before and there’s not much they can do about it,” said Los Angeles Police Sgt. Ken Roth. “They’ll just have to wait for the roads to clear. We’ve already been up there and determined there’s only so much we can do. They’re safe, and kind of on their own until it opens up. It’s one of the disadvantages of having such a good view.”

And although the residents joked that they were cut off completely from the outside world, there were actually two ways into their neighborhood--along a bumpy, slippery, rock-strewn, mile-long dirt road or, for the foolhardy, straight across the river.

A few residents with four-wheel-drive vehicles maneuvered their way along the dirt road, but one teen-ager in a Ford Maverick forded the river--to the amazement of onlookers who expected him to get stuck in the churning brown water.

“Wait until I tell his mother,” Murrey said.

Times staff writer Josh Meyer contributed to this story.

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