A fire experience around Santa Barbara near Montecito in I believe 2009 with a friend

We decided to check how close the fire was coming to my father in laws home so we could be better prepared if we needed to evacuate. 

However, this resulted in this retired Fire Captain from the Navy and myself almost burning up in the fire because of ignorance of how things are done in Santa Barbara because I'm from the SF Bay area and he is from Oxnard. So, we didn't know the local fire protocol for Santa Barbara as a result.

So, when we saw the drapes open with the lights on we thought we were safe and that people hadn't evacuated yet. After we almost died we found out that lights on and drapes open means "We have evacuated. Don't worry about us!" instead.

So, because of this we drove into areas without police or Fire Engines there so we thought we were safe but we were not. 

Then as the fire got nearer to us we decided to go down off the hill we were on for a better view.

However, the only way out we knew of was on fire with 15 to 20 foot gas mains exploding around us which was pretty scary. 

I screeched the tires and did a U-turn out of there and we drove back to a fire station that we saw. They told us that the fire station was going to burn down. We told them we didn't know how to safely get out of there. The Fireman pointed to the last dirt road for us to go down which was the only way out and the route they were going to escape when their fire station burned down. So, we were saved by the fireman and his emergency dirt road out of dying there.

So, we survived. However, my wife's new Lexus smelled like smoke for 3 months and she was pretty angry for us for almost dying because we didn't know that people had evacuated in that area.

And the reason there were no police or firemen there except the fireman evacuating his fire station is that they knew this area was going to burn up and they didn't want to die. Besides, it had already been evacuated except for the Fireman evacuating the fire station at the last moment before it burned up. 

So, We survived and so did my wife's car even though it smelled a little smoky for about 3 months.

However, if you are in a fire and you see the drapes open to living rooms and the lights on maybe you should turn around and go someplace else so you can stay alive and not burn up.