IDYLLWILD, Calif. - Artist Lewis Millett didn't need much more than an order to leave his longtime Idyllwild mountain home after seeing 100-foot flames marching toward the mile-high hamlet that draws tourists, summer campers and students to a year-round arts and music school.

Millet and his wife scooped up the precious things that matter most from their three-story Southern California home: their two cats, his paintings and sculptures and one of his family's prized heirlooms - his father's Congressional Medal of Honor.

Millet was among the 6,000 residents and tourists told to evacuate the community in the San Jacinto Mountains about 100 miles from Los Angeles as the wildfire grew to more than 35 square miles Thursday, wreathing a ridge about 2 to 3 miles from town, fire officials said. The blaze also was 2 miles away from Palm Springs, but no homes were threatened there.

It had already destroyed at least six houses and mobile homes and several cars when winds shifted Wednesday and sent the blaze toward Idyllwild.

"It's never been this bad, and it's never been this close," Millett, 61, said as he sat on a cot in an evacuation center in Hemet, a nearby community. "I have high anxiety."

Fire officials said the blaze was just 15 percent contained and had been growing in an atypical manner.

"Usually it cools down at night and we get more humidity. That hasn't happened," said Tina Rose, a spokeswoman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. "It's been burning like it's daytime for 72 hours in a row."

Fire officials were worried about the weather during the late afternoon when temperatures peak and the blaze can move more rapidly.

"What we're concerned about is what you see right here," said U.S Forest Service Fire Chief Jeanne Pincha-Tulley, pointing to a hazy sky. "When you get a column that puts out this much smoke, embers get into the column and can drop anywhere."

She added the column was expected to go right over Idyllwild for the next two days. While authorities said only 5 percent of the town rebuffed evacuating, they cautioned they might not be able to help those who remain if conditions worsen.

"We cannot guarantee your safety if the fire runs into town," said Idyllwild Fire Protection District Chief Patrick Reitz.

The 22,800-acre fire spread in three directions through thick brush and trees. Roughly 4,100 houses, condos, cabins and several hotels in Idyllwild and surrounding communities were threatened. Fire crews struggled to carve fire lines around the town to block the towering flames.

Authorities said the fire was "human-caused" but they wouldn't say whether it was accidental or intentional. There have been no reports of any injuries.

The small town on the other side of the mountains that tower over the desert community of Palm Springs is known for the arts and is surrounded by national forest popular with hikers and flanked by two large rocks that are favorites for climbers. Popular campgrounds, hiking trails and 30 mile section of the Pacific Crest Trail that runs 2,650 miles from the Mexican border to Canada were closed.