To Its Dismay, Laguna’s Now a Sightseeing Stop

For 23-year-old Chris Thomas, the day of grim sightseeing had just begun.

The Lake Forest resident stood on Park Avenue on Saturday afternoon and was transfixed by the charred ridges of the Mystic Hills neighborhood, where 59 homes had been destroyed by fire. “They won’t let us up to where the houses are,” said a disappointed Thomas, who was among the hundreds of people who descended on the city Saturday to see the destruction for themselves.

They came by car, bike, even tour bus. And many of the gawkers arrived with binoculars around their necks, cameras slung over their shoulders and video recorders rolling.

Others, such as Thomas, recorded the scene only with their eyes.

“This is pretty gnarly,” the Saddleback College student said. “We are going to see the Ortega fire next. I guess that one is still going strong.”

Orange County sheriff’s deputies, who opened Park Avenue to through traffic for the first time Saturday morning, said swarms of spectators began filing in about 9 a.m. and continued unabated until late afternoon.

The sight of two Starline tour buses packed with passengers snaking up the fire-ravaged hills elicited an angry reaction from resident Bob Eldredge.

As the buses traveled on narrow Glenneyre Street about 12:30 p.m., several residents on the sidewalk shouted and made hand gestures at the vehicles, Eldredge said.

The street was not hit by the fires, but Eldredge said that “the only reason they’d drive on Glenneyre would be to look at the carnage. If the buses were just on Coast Highway, I could say they were going to Del Mar or San Diego. But they were on this narrow street. It could only be for one purpose.

“I mentioned it at the market and everyone said, ‘Oh, my God.’ ”

Charlie Bigloo, an operations dispatcher for Starline, said “four or five” buses were chartered to Laguna Beach on Saturday as part of a daylong trip for senior citizens from Los Angeles. Bigloo said he didn’t know if the trip was scheduled before or after the fires.

Although sheriff’s deputies blocked the only entrance to the heavily damaged El Morro Beach Mobile Home Park, Wayne Marrs, 24, and Mike McKinnon, 25, managed to slip through on their mountain bikes Saturday morning. They mingled among residents sifting through the remains of their homes.

“I basically wanted to see the devastation,” Marrs said after snapping a quick picture of the rubble with a small camera.

Wearing bicycle helmets, cycling pants and gloves, Marrs, of Laguna Beach, and McKinnon, of Long Beach, said they cycle in the hills of Laguna Canyon most weekends and planned to spend Saturday cruising the most devastated areas.

“We’re going to ride up to Skyline Drive next,” Marrs said. “Something like this happens once in a lifetime and everyone wants to come and take a look and see what happened. It’s a humbling experience.”

Mobile home park residents said they were grateful that deputies had so far managed to keep away most of the curious onlookers.

“We haven’t had too much of a problem yet, but (Friday) we caught two people going through a person’s house who we know,” said 26-year-old Jay Wallace, a law student whose parents’ trailer was damaged in the blaze. “If we see anyone in here looking around, we’re going to have a word with them. This is a close community.”

Jesse Alvarez, a 22-year-old maintenance worker from Santa Ana, had tried to drive to Laguna Beach on Wednesday as the fire raged but was stopped outside the city by authorities.

“University Drive (in Irvine) was the closest I could get,” said Alvarez, who returned Saturday. “I’ve been wanting to get up in this area since Friday. I’ve been up to (Park Avenue) many times in the past just to see the view and I’ve never seen as many cars here as there is today. I guess everyone is doing the same thing I am.”

Among those on Park Avenue on Saturday was Tom Thorne, a 36-year-old contractor from Huntington Beach. Thorne snapped photos of his 7-year-old son, Grant, as the blond-haired youngster stood near the charred hillside pointing toward Skyline Drive.

“It’s a lot worse than I thought,” Thorne said. “You can’t really imagine it until you get here.”

Mark Shimrack, 40, and Rhonda Valles, 21, said curiosity brought them to Laguna Beach to view the devastation that they had only seen in the newspapers and on television.

“It’s such a tragedy,” said Shimrack, of Costa Mesa. “I hope to heck they catch whoever started this.”

Valles said she had been ready to evacuate her Newport Beach home Wednesday as the fire raged. After staring somberly at the hills for several long minutes, she said she was ready to go see a movie, preferably a comedy.

“This is really depressing,” she said.

Marketing executive Ted Thurston, 50, said he didn’t want to get in anybody’s way as he trudged up Park Avenue with a camera. He just wanted a quick peek.

“I guess they already have enough looky-loos,” said Thurston, who lives in South Laguna Beach. “I’ve snapped a few pictures. Fortunately, I have a telephoto lens, because they are restricting traffic. I’ve satisfied my curiosity for today.”

Long Beach resident John Shimshock, 29, said he and a friend decided “to go for a ride” after breakfast Saturday and found themselves in Laguna Beach.

“We were just in the neighborhood,” Shimshock said, seeming embarrassed. “They won’t let us in where all the houses are burned, but I’m kind of thinking of coming back in a few weeks when all those streets are open.”

Evacuated from his Laguna Beach home Wednesday night, 24-year-old Jay Chaney said the fire came within 15 yards of his house. He took several pictures while standing on a rock in a park in the Top of the World area.

“I had to come up here and see it,” Chaney said. “It’s kind of like a death. When someone dies, you have a funeral to somehow reconcile the loss. That’s what I’m doing here today. Making the fire a reality.”

Times correspondent Shelby Grad contributed to this story.