La Tortue and I spent several days along the central coast of California, where we visited family and friends. This reconnection with the oak savannah of my childhood has been splendid and serene. After Pismo Beach, I discovered Guadalupe, a broad valley along the coast that is ringed all around by mountain ranges that hold […]
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Standing at Pismo Beach
How to describe the light that erupts along the central coast of California? From the oak-studded ranch land around Pozo, where my mother grew up in the shadows of the Los Padres National Forest, I climbed over the Cuesta Grade through the Santa Lucia mountain range and dropped down to the Pacific shore. There, I […]
At the end of the road
La Tortue huffed and strained her way up Redwood Road on the outskirts of Napa, California, right to the end of the road. Here, I found my old friend and fellow-writer Robin Lewis, who lives with his wife Lynne on an old family farm amidst the birds, deer, coyotes and wild foxes. Redwood Creek flows […]
Pockets of Agates
The El Nino storms hit Klamath, California hard on Thursday. La Tortue trembled in the force of the wind. Rain pounded on the roof, waking me in the dead of the night. Miraculously, I lay warm and dry. (Thank goodness I am getting too old for tent camping.) For the next several days, I watched […]
Redwood Majesty
I parked La Tortue beside the pristine Smith River in Jedediah Smith State Park last night, a preserve of old and second-growth redwood trees. Today, I walked in a grove where fire had swept through hundreds of years ago; many of the oldest trees were scarred by the flames, but continued to adapt and even […]
La Tortue and my hero Neil
Neil is my mechanic for the vehicle that will power my trip to the redwood forests beginning next week. The 1996 Rialta 21 ft. camper van needed a little work, including a multi-function switch. Too bad Neil can’t install one in my writer’s brain: it’s a challenge to remember all the small packing details […]