Several popular parks closed because of blazes

Wildfires in Sonoma County scorched a popular mountain biking park — Trione-Annadel State Park — and three other state parks and a county park in the area remained closed Wednesday, according to the California Department of Parks and Recreation and Sonoma County Parks and Recreation.

All trails, roads and access points at Trione-Annadel, Jack London, Sugarloaf Ridge and Robert Louis Stevenson were shut down by rangers Monday. At Spring Lake County Park, which adjoins Annadel, all campers were evacuated Monday and rangers have blocked public access.

In addition, in Contra Costa County, Mount Diablo State Park remains under temporary closure as a precaution with the National Weather Service’s red flag warning for severe fire danger persisting into the week.

State Parks Director Lisa Mangat said through a spokeswoman that the agency is monitoring and assessing the situation throughout the region, often hour by hour.

In addition to the shutdown of Mount Diablo State Park, the East Bay Regional Park District posted a warning Tuesday for extreme fire danger for 23 parks and very high fire danger for an additional 40 parks. The district said it could also choose to shut down access at some parks, as it has in the past, until the fire alerts pass.

The largest areas burned in state parks have been been at Trione-Annadel State Park and Sugarloaf Ridge, where satellite cameras equipped by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection with fire detecting technology showed hillside acres burning.

Heavy smoke has made it difficult for state parks to assess the damage by helicopter or airplanes, said department spokesman Jorge Moreno. Officials are relying instead on Cal Fire’s satellite images and video.

In one image at Annadel, east of Santa Rosa, high winds created nearly horizontal flames as the fire stormed out of the park. No structures have burned at Annadel, Moreno said.

Most park visitors call Trione-Annadel simply “Annadel,” one of the region’s best parks for mountain biking amid its 5,000 acres. Like much of the area, the landscape consists of grassland foothills peppered with oak, and forested ravines, where dry, hot weather with winds had set off red flag warnings just prior to the start of the blazes. Cal Fire’s “Fire Detection Footprint” satellite imagery showed fires burning Wednesday along the eastern shore of Lake Ilsanjo, with severe pockets of burn above that.

At Sugarloaf Ridge, a 4,000acre park with trails for hiking, mountain biking and horseback riding, park rangers evacuated campers and all employees, Moreno said. The fire detection footprint showed vast areas of the canyon slopes along Adobe Canyon burned Wednesday morning, with pockets of fire inside the park and other fires approaching park boundaries. In Robert Louis Stevenson State Park along Highway 29 above Calistoga, the trail to Mount St. Helena was unscathed as of Wednesday morning; same for the trails that lead to the Palisades above the northern Sonoma Valley. However, two swaths of fire on the slopes that lead up Mount St. Helena, kept the park at risk, according to Cal Fire.

At Jack London State Park near Glen Ellen, a landmark for its historical value, the buildings have emerged safe and historic artifacts have been moved, Moreno said.