Carrizo Plain Super Bloom I Finally Timed It Right

Yesterday ended on the cliffs above Big Sur, high above the crashing waves and the salty air, and now it's this. Wide open, quiet, nothing but hills. It couldn't feel more different. The Carrizo Plain. Word is there's a super bloom happening, but out here timing is everything. I don't really know what I'm driving into today, but it feels promising. It's so fragrant out here. All right, I'm heading south on highway one right now. I'm leaving Big Sur and starting to drive inland toward the Carrizo Plain. The plan is to try and catch the wildflowers during the super bloom. I'm back on the road headed inland and it's already a different world out here. After the coast, this just feels wide open. Blue sky, green hills, and you couldn't ask for better weather. It's warm, but not too warm. Just enough breeze to keep it comfortable. Honestly, it's one of those days where everything seems to be lining up. I've been trying to get out here for a few years now. I just kept missing it. Either too early, nothing going on, or too late, it's already gone. But today, I don't know, feels like I might have actually timed it right for once. Well, so far there's a decent amount of wildflowers, but it is so cool out here just now. I'm just really enjoying this. I'm just really enjoying this grassland. It's kind of with the red-winged blackbirds singing. Man, nothing says springtime like the song of the red-winged blackbird. I'm starting to see a little color here and there. Not much, just hints. It's hard to tell if that's it, or if I'm still a little early. I've never been out here before, so I don't really know what it's supposed to look like. I'm just kind of guessing as I go. Part of me is thinking maybe I missed it, or maybe I haven't gotten to it yet. Either way, it's still pretty incredible out here. Reminds me when I used to be a farmer, when I'd grow my cover crops, the blackbirds would nest in the cover crop. In the spring, they would just, it would be a chorus of red-winged blackbirds. It's like one of my favorite sounds on earth. This place isn't always like this. Middle of summer, it's just dry hills, blonde and faded. The kind of landscape you'd drive right past without thinking twice. But in the spring, it's completely transformed. Everything's alive. Greens, yellows. It almost doesn't feel real, like I'm off to see the wizard. It sure is pretty out here. I have no idea where I'm going to camp though. There doesn't seem like a lot of options. There's like a field of yellow. Wow. Anyways, I'm searching for camp now. Wish me luck. I've got my eyes peeled for a good place to camp, but so far it's just this narrow ribbon cutting through everything, winding through the hills with no obvious spots. The map makes it look like there are options out here, little offshoots here and there, but most of them are blocked off and the ones that aren't just lead to ranch stuff, like fences, troughs, nothing you'd want to set up next to. So I'll just keep driving. This is a cool California adventure between Big Sur and Carrizo Plain. Two really, really different and unique landscapes. Watching the light start to drop, doing that mental math of how much time I've got left, hoping something opens up soon. There's not really a backup plan. All right, I found a beautiful camp spot finally, up on a hill kind of overlooking the valley down to the east and that's out to the west. So yeah, I'm going to start setting up camp. This is beautiful up here. Very, very pleasant. A little breezy, but I don't think it'll be too crazy. I always wanted to camp in a place like this. It's just like hills and grassland and wildflowers and blue sky. Spring has sprung in the Carrizo Plain. It just turned out to be pretty amazing, I gotta say. First Big Sur on the edge of the continent and now inland in the heart of California and the grasslands with the super bloom. Gotta love California. Where to next? As soon as I saw this spot, I knew it was the one. I pulled up onto this hill and that was it. I didn't need anything else. There's a breeze, but it's soft, just enough to move through the grass. It's cooler now, but still comfortable. Honestly, it almost feels like I'm just hanging out in the backyard. Just a really good backyard. The fire's going, the sun's dropping. There's nothing else to figure out but dinner. I'm just here for a little while and yeah, this feels pretty close to perfect. I've spent all my life in California and yeah, it's not perfect. Things change. Some of it's frustrating. Some of it's hard to ignore. But then I get out to a place like this and it reminds me of why I stay. There's still so much of it that feels wild, open, and full of life. Places like this remain largely unaffected by all the BS. They've been here long before it and with any luck they'll be here long after to inspire us all for generations to come. I'll bet you were thinking he's going to cut himself. That's a big steak. Wish Bowie was here. At least there's no bears here. I'm proud of myself. I actually made dinner. All that's left is to sit by the fire and dream about the approaching summer and the places I'll go. I wake up to the sound of blackbirds and another beautiful morning. I take a minute to sit down and put some thoughts on paper before packing up and heading out. Well, I'm excited to tell you guys that I'm going to be getting rid of the rooftop tent and the rack. I'm changing to a whole new system. I'm getting a canopy camper. I think it's being built right now and I should get it in a couple months. I'm really excited to not have to deal with a ladder anymore. It's almost the main thing that makes me want a canopy camper. I hate those ladders. And the fact that I'll be able to, you know, do things like change clothes in the morning, stand up in the back of my truck. It'll give me a lot more usable space in the back of my truck. I'm hoping to do away with most if not all of these wolf pack boxes. It's a drag having to take them out of the truck, set them down on the ground, living off of the ground basically. So that'll be nice too. I'm excited to get it all set up so that I just have everything where it needs to be all the time. So when I get to camp, I just pretty much pop the top and make a fire. So I'll give you more details about that as it comes to fruition. So I'm almost packed up here. I'm going to head out the other way, not the way that I came. I'm going to go west and check out the west side of Carrizo Plain. You're pretty lucky if you can get out here within the few weeks that this happens every year. And it just so happens to have worked out that I made it. This is really incredible out here. It's so different to be just camping in the grassy hills. I mean, there's no trees. It's just grassland. Lots of lupins, lots of clover, lots of different kinds of yellow flowers. It's pretty incredible. But this is an area, you know, if you're driving down Highway 101, you look off in the distance and it's just brown hills. And it'll be like that before too long here. But for now, it's just a spring green paradise. The birds are chirping. Everything is happy here in the Carrizo Plain. Okay, I'm all packed up. Shame to leave such a beautiful place, but it's time to shove off. Springtime doesn't stick around for long out here. You get a small window and then it's gone again. It's the same hills and the same road, just not like this. Kind of reminds me of how a lot of things work. You wait too long, you miss it. And if you're not paying attention, it passes you by. And every once in a while, you actually catch it at the right time. And that's all this is. The right place at the right time. And I'll take that whenever I can get it. These flowers smell. So if there's something on your list, don't wait for tomorrow. Plan it out and make it happen. This is Brian from Los Boros Overland. And until the next one, I'll see you down the trail. Adios!