The Peninsula Hotel in Beverly Hills is rammed. As Los Angeles is engulfed by fire, the Hollywood Hills are emptying into it. A line of cars snakes up to the entrance round the clock, and the world's oddest collection of refugees throngs the lobby as valets and bellboys rush back and forth. With nothing to do but sit out the crisis, the bar is heaving. And this being Tinseltown, it's full of long-limbed women and white-haired men. It's a landscape of Botox and fillers and sour cocktails. A room at the Peninsula ($1,550 a night for a basic double) is as good a place as any to weather the apocalypse. It's where I am as I write this, after I was forced to throw my belongings into a suitcase, and get out of the house to escape the wildfires.
