UPDATE to story below: The fire has been contained and the road is open to 2 lanes of traffic. Here’s the update:
http://www.triplicate.com/news/story.cfm?story_no=9481.
A small fire about 40 minutes or so northeast of the hostel has closed highway 199 between Hiouchi and Gasquet (see link below). This is the main roads connecting people coming from Portland on the I-5 to Highway 101, which passes outside our door. For those of you coming from the north in the next few days, we recommend cutting over to the coast and coming straight down the 101. We have also received reports that 299 is experiencing periodic closures due to fires. This road is about an hour south of the hostel, and connect 101 with the I-5 near Redding. If you are coming from San Francisco, we always recommend coming up the 101, and not cutting over from the I-5, but now it may be a necessity to come that way.
CalTrans does operate a handy phone # which provides updates on the latest for each highway. We recommend keeping this # handy: 1-800-427-7623 (within California) or 916-445-7623 (outside of California). When prompted, state the name of the road (such as “199” or “299”) and they will tell you the latest updates and closures for that road.
Here is the story of the fire : http://www.triplicate.com/news/story.cfm?story_no=9469.