As Isolation Stretches On, Big Sur Endures

In the 30 years that he has lived on this wildly beautiful stretch of California’s coast, Noel Thygeson has survived floods, fires, mudslides and hurricane-force winds. But never, he says, has he seen the community as isolated as it has been in the five weeks since storms ripped through and closed California 1 north and south of town.

“This one is a beaut,” said Thygeson, a now-unemployed firewood salesman who spoke as he pasted stamps on a stack of bills at the post office. “There is no tourism, no business, no money. I’m mailing out my bills now because that’s the last money I’ve got.”

Torrential rains have reduced Big Sur, one of California’s best-known tourist destinations and playground of the very rich, to a community of the unemployed.

Dozens of its children, cut off from their classrooms in neighboring Carmel, are being home-schooled or are studying at a makeshift schoolhouse in town.

Others, like Lygia Chappellet’s daughter Sequoia, have been staying with friends in Carmel since February to attend school. The separation, the artist said, has been hard.

“She calls me every night. On the one hand, she likes the freedom, but this has been traumatic for her,” Chappellet said.

Parents have been laid off from jobs at closed hotels, restaurants, boutiques and art galleries--virtually the only businesses in town.

The only access residents in central and southern Big Sur have to the outside world is a torturous, two- to three-hour drive along the hairpin turns of the mountainous Nacimiento-Fergusson Road inland to King City. A trip to the closest full-service grocery store now can take six hours round-trip and employees at local delis make daily runs to keep basics on their increasingly bare shelves.

Caltrans is struggling to repair 20 damaged sites on the 70-mile stretch of California 1 that winds from the southern border of Monterey County north to Carmel. But even with a crew of 150 working seven days a week, the agency says the road may not reopen to outside traffic before the end of April.

“This could change because of more storms, or if another slide occurs,” said Caltrans spokeswoman Val Houdyshell.

The road closure, she said, has hurt the tourist industry throughout Monterey County, although only Big Sur is truly cut off. Drivers mistakenly believe that they can’t get to Monterey, Carmel or San Simeon, all of which can be reached by U.S. 101.

Evacuating Residents in Helicopters

Facing at least six more weeks of road closure, Big Sur residents have called in outside experts for advice on long-term strategies for dealing with disaster, and opened a food bank to serve the most destitute.

“In 1995, we had the fire, and that was rough,” said volunteer Fire Chief Frank Pinney, director of the community’s disaster relief operation. “But our command center was open then for just 10 days. We’ve been opened five weeks now, and that gets to be a little bit more of a challenge.”

About a third of the estimated 1,400 people who live in Big Sur have at least temporarily abandoned the community. Many fled in National Guard helicopters that evacuated tourists in February. Those remaining are retired, local business owners, the few workers who are still employed and those who have no jobs and no place to go.

There are no more National Guard helicopter flights, and last week Caltrans suspended the once-a-week car convoys north to Carmel that had allowed residents a chance to shop for groceries and run errands. About 400 motorists made the two-hour trip each Friday, which normally takes less than an hour. Then another storm hit, taking out still more of California 1 at Hurricane Point, just north of town, prompting Caltrans to halt the convoys for at least three weeks.

In northern Big Sur, the 500 or so residents of Palo Colorado and Garrapata canyons are cut off from central Big Sur, and have severely restricted access north to Carmel. California 1 is opened for those residents to drive north from 5:30 a.m. to 8:30 a.m. daily. The road reopens for their return from 5 p.m. to 8:45 p.m., said longtime Palo Colorado resident Barbara Cox.

“It has been really rough on the little kids who go to school,” Cox said.

The California Highway Patrol has banned school buses south of Carmel because of road conditions, so parents must drive out children before dawn and pick them up in the evening.

Even as their isolation intensifies, Big Sur’s remaining residents--a mix of artists, white-collar refugees from big cities and aging hippies--seem surprisingly buoyant. They laughingly refer to themselves as the “self-sustainers,” the term coined by relief workers.

“The attitude is: we chose it. We live down here in the wild country. That means fires, floods and mudslides,” said longtime resident Laura Moran, head of the local Chamber of Commerce.

Indeed, many residents insist that they are enjoying the break from daily routine that the road closure has imposed. And they express pride in the way local businesses have responded to the emergency.

At the Esalen Institute, home to some of the world’s most famous hot springs, the storms destroyed the building that for decades had provided nude bathers with a staggering view of the Pacific Ocean as they soaked in hot tubs filled with the mineral-laden water that springs from the cliffs. But the institute is keeping 100 work-study residents busy repairing damaged buildings and paths.

“The energy has been redirected toward fixing up the place,” said spokesman Torrey Waag.

The owners of Esalen, a nonprofit educational institution, plan a fund-raising campaign to raise more than $1 million to rebuild the baths, he said.

Pulling Together to Aid One Another

Hotels that normally charge guests $250 to $650 a night now house highway engineers and other relief workers for free. Two of the most posh resorts, the Post Ranch Inn and Ventana, have tried to limit the number of workers being laid off by launching maintenance, repair and improvement projects.

Two of the three restaurants still open in town serve weekly low-cost meals to hundreds of residents who wait in long lines. Many closed hotels and restaurants are serving their staffs--even those who have been laid off--at least one meal a day.

Postal workers haul hundreds of pounds of mail daily over a still-active mudslide at Hurricane Point north of Big Sur, where more than 100 feet of California 1 broke off and plunged into the ocean.

Parents and teachers sent from Carmel keep the children who can no longer be bused north to middle school or high school abreast of their studies in a makeshift classroom where 30 students meet for four hours each weekday.

Some of the students miss their classmates, but others seem to be thriving, said Tom Galloway, a substitute teacher sent by the Carmel school district to monitor astudy hall and answer questions for students from sixth grade through high school.

“The disasters are the social events of Big Sur,” Galloway said. “Other times, people are so busy surviving, trying to make a living, that they don’t get to visit much.”

Galloway moved out of Big Sur several years ago after most of his yard broke away during a storm and plunged hundreds of feet into the ocean. Since the February storms, he stays in Big Sur during the week and drives six hours to Carmel on weekends.

Once a week, Pinney and other relief workers meet with residents to keep them informed of road closures and government efforts to help. A meeting last Wednesday at the Big Sur Center drew a standing-room-only crowd that took the news of the canceled convoys calmly.

“The good news is that it is a beautiful day in Big Sur,” joked one disaster official. “The bad news is that there are no more convoys.” The crowd barely murmured its disappointment before turning to other items on the agenda. That evening, at the upscale Big Sur River Inn, more than 200 people turned out for a dinner of turkey and all the trimmings for $5.

“After a couple of weeks, you get a little nervous, then it is pretty nice,” said Aengus Wagner, a now-unemployed waiter, who waited nearly half an hour for a meal. “Today I hiked in the mountains and it was beautiful. You do gardening, volunteering. I miss the income, but I can say that people here love this, they love having Big Sur to themselves.”

Wagner acknowledged that the isolation and unemployment is easier on young, single adults than for couples with children to support.

“But everyone knows that this situation is inevitable. There is nothing you can do about it,” he said.

Chappellet, the artist, said her business has been disrupted because there are no tourists to buy her artwork and no way to ship out pieces bought before the storms.

Still, she said, she would not dream of leaving this community.

“I love being in contact with a very dramatic setting,” she said. “And my children adore Big Sur. To uproot them would be very difficult.”

At the post office, worker Paul Lesniak sorted through a mountain of mail to be forwarded and mused about why so many have stayed.

“Part of the reason I moved out here is the adventure,” said Lesniak, who has lived in Big Sur for a decade. “If you’re into amenities, forget it, but this community is as close as you are going to get to the pioneer spirit. Certainly, the stress level is up for some people, but disasters also bring out the best.”

The enforced isolation bothers him sometimes, Lesniak said, and he is sure that some who have left will not return.

“This will be the shakeout of the marginal people who come here to play,” he said. “It is not the way of life for everybody and sometimes Big Sur decides that for you.”

Accountant Jerry Schiff recoiled in mock horror when asked whether he thinks about leaving Big Sur. Schiff’s redwood-and-glass house, perched at the end of three miles of dirt road on Pfeiffer Ridge, survived the storms unscathed. But 120-mph winds ripped the roof off his guest house, and he figures he’ll have to demolish the structure.

Still, said Schiff, who describes himself as a Manhattan refugee, his love affair with this wild landscape will continue.

“Move? Never. I love the peace and the quiet. You wouldn’t ask if it was worth it if you could watch the sunset over the ocean from my house.”