California

Big Sur Battered By Storms, River Rushes Through Campground

A favorite destination for many Bay Area campers and day trippers — Big Sur on the Central Coast just 90 minutes from San Jose, California —was battered by weekend storms.

A San Francisco Chronicle reporter shot video of the Big Sur river rushing through the Riverside cabins and campgrounds. One of the most beloved parks, Andrew Molera State Park, was under a deluge of water on Monday. And a local blogger and her helpers captured many of the dramatic images of the flooding. The Monterey County Sheriffalso  issued a warning for people to "turn around before you drown." A log jam of debris also burst loose Sunday, as trees and rocks started flowing freely down the Big Sur River.

BigSur_Topple
Courtesy Jim Allday
The Pioneer Cabin tree fell in Calaveras State Park on Sunday, Jan. 8, 2017.

As a result of the weather, several state Big Sur parks were closed Monday, including Andrew Molera, Pfeiffer Big Sur and Pfeiffer Beach because of the hazardous weather outlook issued by the National Weather Service.

The small town was hit with several mudslides, debris flow and flooding, including one on Monday by the cliff-side restaurant Nepenthe.

Despite that, Stan Russell, executive director of the Big Sur Chamber of Commerce, said "everyone seems to be doing fine," he told NBC Bay Area. "Everyone took cover and let the storm roll over us, for the most part."

Big Sur is often described as the "greatest meeting of land and water in the world," and is a rugged area where the river and the Pacific Ocean meet.

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