Our good FGL friends, Mike and Cliff have been back to the site and reported:

For those who have not been up to Fountaingrove since the fire, prepare to be shocked.  It really looks like the pictures of war zones in Syria, except the streets are impeccably clean – not sure if they had street sweepers or if it was just the wind at the time of the fire.  Last weekend, they made people with passes exit to the east.  So we had to drive all the way through all the destruction.  The pictures on TV do not do it justice.  It just seems to go on forever.  On the other hand, it is almost surreal when you come up to FGL/Stonefield on Bicentennial because you see almost nothing until you get almost to FGL.  Then there is the burned meadow across Thomas Lake Harris Drive and the burned down Oaks Condominiums to the north of FGL.  But they are so flattened that if you did not know they had been there, you might not even notice that there is nothing there.  Travelling on around Thomas Lake Harris Drive, reveals that there is very little left – just a single house here or there.  But mostly everything is gone.

We will know on Monday, when we can move back in, and it looks like it won’t be more than a couple of weeks.  All would be well except that Elvon has been in a steady decline, since we left.  I am getting home help, and the Physical Therapist, who was here yesterday, agrees with me that there is no reason why he cannot transfer to a walker or a chair.  But, he won’t. When presented with the option, he shakes something terrible, and refuses to budge.  No one will take him except a full on memory care place, and I am desperately trying to find one, that will only charge me an arm and a leg, and not both of them.

I wrote that yesterday.  Last night he transferred nicely, had dinner at the table and transferred back into bed.  In the middle of the night he got up, transferred nicely to the chair and the toilet, and that solved a problem that had been bothering me for three days.

Our wonderful friends, Pat and Jo Gibbons, did some phone work, and I think they have turned up a place, nearby.  I need to get out and have a look at it, but meanwhile, I sent them the Doctor’s work up, to get him approved.  If he continues well, it might be better to keep him here, until the Lodge re-opens, so as not to disturb him too much.  These are more familiar surroundings.  Candy and Ernie, bless their hearts, are okay with that, despite having other house guests arriving.  We love our fabulous friends.

And, we’ll wait until Monday, when FGL lets us know our re-entry date and make the decision, then.