Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve

It wasn't a sure thing that I could post today. We are staying at a really terrible KOA in Acton, California. We have no cell service and a slow internet connection. Sometimes it makes writing a blog post with pictures downright painful.

There are no really good choices for RV parks in this area. When we visited last year, we stayed in a park in Lancaster. It was bad enough that we added it to our blacklist of RV parks; meaning, we'll never stay there again. This KOA has been so bad that I think we've finally written the whole of the KOA parks off our list. With a very few exceptions, KOA's are overpriced and run down. I won't go into all of the reasons we're unhappy with this one, but we're just here two nights, and then moving on to a park we know we like in Borrego Springs. KOA always sends us an email after a stay asking us to rate their park. Generally, I complain about most everything, and this time will be no different. I keep saying to Mike, "that'll be in my report." Our membership expires in May, and we will not be renewing. Ever. 

So, rant over, and let's get on with the traveling, shall we? Before leaving Coalinga yesterday, we got Smitty out for a walk. There wasn't a lot of walking, but he did find some tall grass on which to graze. He really likes a little greenery in his diet.

We're having to learn all the new kitty hidey holes with this new rig. We've learned a few of them. Yesterday, we played the Where's Smitty? game. He's found a nice little hiding place on either side of the bed. We think this is where they like to ride when we go down the road.

All the way as we've been going down the road, we've seen lots of birds of prey. It's impossible to get a shot of them, but I tried getting this one just as he took off from a fence post. We've seen hawks and kestrels, and we even think we saw a bald eagle. As it turns out, this was nothing more exotic than a crow.

We've also seen lots of wildflowers just driving down the road. Here's a field of yellow...hard to say what they are without seeing them up close.

We drove without stopping for lunch yesterday because the drive was relatively short. At one point, Mike got sleepy and so we stopped at a truck stop to pick up some Red Bull for him. As we were getting back in the truck to continue on, we noticed this sign directly ahead of us. Taft is Mike's birthplace. We're often threatening to go take a look because Mike hasn't been back to the place since his mom moved him and his sister to Vista when he was two. We're both kind of curious to see what the place looks like, but so far...no dice. We continued on.

We still had about 60 miles to go, but wow...after so long traveling I-5, we were very glad to get off here.

The hillsides are all abloom with wildflowers. It was encouraging because we've heard conflicting reports about what we'll see.

Below is the hillside directly above our campsite.

This morning I had time to finish the hand quilting for my little embroidery sampler. I still want to give this a green binding.

There was still time for stitching this morning, and so I went to work on the flamingo binding. I've turned the first corner, but no picture. You'll have to take my word for it.

After that, we headed out to the poppy reserve. It's about an hour away from us. We stopped off first to have Egg McMuffin at McDonald's. We rarely eat fast food, but we loves us an Egg McMuff when we're traveling. As we approached the poppy reserve, we could see bright patches of color off in the distance.

We arrived around 10:00 a.m. If memory serves, they open their gates around 9:00 a.m.

Already there was about a 10 minute wait to pay our day use fee at the gate, but there was still plenty of parking.

Getting out of the truck we looked up and saw this:

Before we go on, I need to let you know how we're going to die today. Watch your step, please. Stay on the trail, no picking the flowers, and nobody gets hurt.

And what a thrill this was. I don't think the flowers have reached their peak bloom yet, but they were still wonderful.

Here are a few close-ups. This is the state flower of California, and it's easy to see why.

Mike recycled our handout before I had a chance to identify all of these. Maybe one of you will know.

The Painted Lady butterflies are migrating through by the zillions. We've seen thousands at least. They really liked this particular yellow flower.

They are hard to photograph because they fly fast and rarely light anywhere. There was an interesting article about them in this morning's NY Times. It was hard to see my camera screen in the bright sunlight, and it seemed as soon as I had a bead on one, it flew away and vanished. Often, I was just shooting blind, hoping to get something.  Luck was with me, and I got some pretty good shots.

This one held still for quite some time. If I'm remembering what I know about them, they often land on the dirt to get water and/or salt.

So it was quite a thrill to see the poppies and the butterflies.

Near the interpretive center, there was a Joshua Tree in bloom.

The image above is the largest bloom, but it also had some smaller ones near the top.

When we left the park, the line to get in was significantly longer.

We stopped off at a grocery store and then had our requisite In-N-Out Burger. We don't have In-N-Out in Oregon...except one that is too far south for us. But we're not bitter. Oh no. Anyway...we always have one when we're in Southern California. When we got back to the RV, we got Smitty out for another short walk. What he really wanted was to roll in the dust.

Okay, and that brings you up to date. We'll be moving on to Borrego Springs tomorrow. We're staying at a very nice (and very expensive) RV park there where they have the most delicious hot tubs from mineral hot springs. We'll be there three nights, and we'll be doing some hiking in the Anza-Borrego Desert where the wildflower superbloom is in progress. After that, we'll move along to Death Valley.