“We’re not religious people, but I said, ‘If they save the house, I’m going to church tomorrow,’” the retired cabinet-maker said.

Gordon and his wife, Margaret, left convinced they would never see their house again. But, with the help of the Rural Fire Service, their home survived, although’s Gordon’s promise quickly evaporated in the inferno’s aftermath. He didn’t go to church.

“When I come back home I said, ‘I’ve conned Him.’ But He might get even with me. I might have a heart attack.”

Fire crews were busy “blacking out” on the Tilligery peninsula on Monday, turning their hoses on the 2000 hectares of smouldering ash immediately west of Tanilba Bay.

Whoever named the local streets had a love of alliteration and World War I history: Clemenceau Crescent, Pershing Place, Poilus Parade, Victory View.

But, on Saturday, the real battle in town happened along Tilligery Track, where firefighters waged a last-ditch defence against a wall of flames which had swept eastward from Oyster Cove across a flat, sandy expanse of coastal scrub.

“We’ve been through a few fires, but nothing like this,” Margaret said.

“When we left, Gordon said, ‘We’re not going to have a house.’ Because all you could see was the flames.

“I was at the back, and they said, ‘Quick, get out now.’ And by the time I got to the car, it was up over the house. It was so frightening.”

The houses on Tilligery Track were saved by the fireys and a 30-metre buffer zone of white sand and mown grass between their back fences and the scrub. The grass is scorched in places right up to the green Colorbond.

Gordon, who practises his swing “first thing in the morning” beside what was once thick scrub beyond his back fence, could see the bright side.

“I might be able to find me golf balls in there now.”

Gordon and Margaret have retained their sense of humour, but things were different on Saturday as seven fire crews, helicopters and a water-bombing plane were trying to keep the fire at bay.

Their son Gary and grandson Robert, “real bushies” and both rural firefighters, had arrived in the afternoon with eight extinguishers and a determination to save the house.  

“It’s frightening,” Gordon said. “I said, ‘It’s 300 metres away. That’s good.’ The next minute: Oh boy. They said get out. I’ve never seen anything move so fast.

“We shot through and sat in Marg’s brother’s house. The kids said, ‘Come home; we saved the house. We didn’t believe it. If you see the video that’s on our iPad [above], unbelievable.’

“Robert was on the roof hosing down the rubber solar mats. He was worried it would melt. That’s how hot it got.”

Down the road, Rochelle O’Brien had a lot on her plate.

She had a husband and daughter stuck at Salt Ash – the only road in and out of the peninsula had been cut off about midday – and four other children and three dogs to look after.

She had lived on Tilligery Track for 16 years and seen a few fires in that time, but none as threatening as Saturday’s.

“I got evacuated at about 7. I stayed here as long as I could with the animals. I just watered out the back, and then they said we had no choice, we had to go, because it was at our back fence.

“I’ve had fireballs come through. One’s hit the back of the roof, a couple of spot fires in our back yard. The fireys have done extremely well.

“They came at four o’clock and advised us to leave, to Lemon Tree Passage Bowling Club, but I had so many animals I just waited it out.

“We had the cars packed with our valuables. I just had to get the animals in the car and took off.”

What do you take with you when you think your house is a goner?

“Photos of the kids when they were little, their birth certificates. I have little folders for each child, with their blue books and all that, so I just took that.

“My animals and a set of clean clothes for all the kids. At the end of the day it doesn’t really matter; as long as they’re safe.

“I tried to come back home with one of my girls just to see how it all was, at about 10.30, 11. It was freezing. The fire was across the road so we were stuck at Lemon Tree. 

“You couldn’t really breathe down there. There was so much smoke it was ridiculous.”

Rochelle had thought the fire had died down in the afternoon, but the wind picked up and the flames jumped Oyster Cove Road 3km away. She left when they were a metre from her back fence.

“I don’t really think I had time to think. It just sort of was from a distance, and then bang, it was just on you.

“You could feel the heat. Everything was orange. If I went out my back door, you couldn’t see anything: just flame. It was high. It was high and it was big. You thought, ‘This is real. It’s time to get out.’”

She said her house had been filled with smoke when she returned home after midnight. 

“The cars are still packed in case we have to go again.”

At Tanilba Bay Golf Club, head greenkeeper Paul Tilly is one of the few to have suffered a material loss from the winter bushfire.

His $12,000 caravan, which he had parked next to one of the club’s sheds two weeks ago, is a black, twisted ruin. It was booked in to be registered and stored on Monday at a nearby business.

The fire was hot enough to bend the caravan’s chassis, but somehow the golf club’s chemical and machinery storage sheds survived mostly intact.

“The van was fine for ages, then one of the windows smashed and an ember went straight through it and it was lost,” Paul said as a kookaburra held a dead, blackened rat in its beak on a nearby branch.

“The fireys couldn’t get close it was that hot.”

Anthony Watson, the club’s secretary manager, evacuated his staff and customers at 1.15pm on Saturday.

Like everyone the Herald spoke to on Monday, he was in awe of the “fantastic” miracle the fire crews had performed.

“They saved the entire course,” he said. “They’ve contained the fire. We’ve had a long couple of days.”

Back on Tilligery Track, Noeleyn Drake had also gone to Sydney.

“When we left in the morning it was under control, no worries. As soon as we got to Sydney, it was out of control. We got back at two o’clock Sunday morning.

“It was scary, but I was thankful I had a home to come to.

“According to my son, as it came across it was totally out of control and all they could do was spray the house and hope for the best, because the flames were coming up over the house.”

Veteran Clarence Town firefighter Des – he wouldn’t give his last name as he was “just one of the crew” – used to be an oyster farmer on the peninsula.

He was part of a mop-up crew on Monday, working on a track off Lemon Tree Passage Road.

He attributed the ferocity of last weekend’s fire to the local flora.

“She’s been a good fire,” he said. “It’s the nature of the country. They burn like buggery. This country, just by the nature of the tea tree scrub, it’s a violent fire when she goes.

“Port Stephens, in the coastal heath area, it’s something that you’ve got to experience to respect what can go wrong.

“The blokes that were here yesterday, they were involved with the fire, and when the flame roared up and the wind swung around a bit, they just had to drop their hoses and bail out because they were going to get cooked.

“It burns quickly. When the flame hits the areas of tea tree scrub and there’s heat, you’ll see the black smoke go roaring up.”

The upper reaches of the gum trees in the area have been left somewhat intact, something Des put down to the “velocity” of the fire.

“The wind strength forces the flame to stay down. You don’t really have enough up the top to crown it.”

Father of three Ryan Evans, who lives a block back from Tilligery Track, left to get some topsoil in Salt Ash with his two young sons at 11am Saturday.

He tried to return at 12.30 but the road was blocked, leaving wife Jessica, daughter Brienna and father-in-law Russell to protect the house.

“My seven-year-old daughter was here. She was petrified,” he said. 

“My wife has photos, standing out the back. You can see the glow coming. She said her dad knew it was something bad when you hear grown men crying and screaming, ‘Get out, get out, get out!’

“Hopefully it doesn’t happen like that again.”