Category Archives: wildflowers

California Mountains – Snow in Springtime

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Spring was a happening thing in the high Sierra. Last winter extended well into June, and on at least one date that month the snowpack was the highest on record. This means that at the end of July when we were there, quite a bit of snow was still melting.

Leopard Lily

From our trailhead at nearly 10,000 feet, we only ascended another 1,000 feet or so, but the difference in the flora was notable. Higher up, the flowers and shrubs were still in bud; the snow hadn’t been gone long.

Willow buds
Mountain Pennyroyal in bud

 


The violent weight of snow had deformed this cluster of trees in such a symmetric way as to be artistic.

 

Spearhead Lake

 

Rosy Sedum with Buttercups

At the highest elevations, every lovely bloom seems like a miracle, when you consider how much of the year the plants are just roots or seeds under the snow, how quickly they are required to respond to the light and warmth and come into their glory.

In some places they were sprouting out of a puddle where snow had likely been lying a few days previous, like in this low place I had to hop over to reach a spot overlooking Long Lake. You can see Mr. G. in the distance ready to spread out our picnic of cheese and crackers.

Around us and at our feet hot pink penstemon was making for a brilliant contrast with the midnight blue water and the granite rocks.

 

Sunless and Satisfying Day

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The beach cottage is next to a creek that forms a lagoon at this time of the year, cut off from the frigid Northern California ocean water by sand dunes and therefore swimmably warm, if you don’t mind the algae.

The whole place is full of memories for me, going back more than 20 years to the first time I was here with our children, who with their homeschooling friends built rafts of driftwood and punted around, while their baby sister crawled through the sand.

Those are abalone shells lined up on the fence.

We’ve come many, many times to this sleepy village, and this week it was to be with our friends who lived full-time in the house for a spell but now only vacation there. Mr. Glad and I are normally just a couple these days, but they were lucky enough to have four of their five daughters with them.

No sooner had we arrived than I discovered the fuchsias and Chinese firecrackers that had enthusiastically taken over the mostly untended yard. They make you think you are in a tropical paradise, until you look up and notice the fog and the golden hills.

In the background of the third fuchsia pic, you can see the wild fennel reaching for the skies. A lot of it has already dried and is getting mildewed.

The fields of rattlesnake grass a block away also contradict the tropical theme. I picked bundles of the stuff before I came to the conclusion that it’s really past its prime and that I should just come back next June to get it when it is still green and the “rattles” are whole.

Sand Art by Mr. G

We packed up some cheese, French and Italian breads, and watermelon, and drove up the coast to another beach just for fun.


One can’t easily predict how grey and cool the days will be out there, but we expected the sun to come out by the afternoon, and we pointed out the little patches of blue we could see here and there near the horizon.

At least it wasn’t terribly cold, though I did keep my sweatshirt on all day. The fog did not lift, but the sun burned some young chests right through it. And I was so happy and busy smelling the seaweed and the beach plants that I didn’t even notice the weather change that never happened.


Some of us took a walk along the bluffs, where I found so many interesting things to see and click my camera at, including stickers and a minty purple flower that filled the low moist places.

Rattlesnake grass and cow parsnip

When we returned to the cottage it was to cook together and cozy up with a big dinner and loving camaraderie — lively talk and laughing followed by sitting on couches and in rockers. Mr. G and I couldn’t help ourselves, taking lots of pictures of the girls so clearly content and comfortable with each other, tucked in with overlapping arms and legs and smiling so much you wouldn’t believe it.

I didn’t mind the grey skies, because the flowers and friendship made the best kind of sunshine.

California Mountains – Tahoe

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( 2nd of many posts in a series. 1st post: Getting Over )

Our neighbor camper played his lonely and cheery mandolin for hours each day that we were at the Meeks Bay Campground.

We had pitched our tent within walking distance of the beach, where we were surprised to see three or four Canada geese looking for handouts or taking a dip with the other bathers. The many children liked to chase them in the water occasionally, but the geese always swam faster than the children could run through the chilly waters.

The lake is high this year, the beaches shrunken, but we found a spot to plunk our chairs down in the sand with a view to people-and-geese-watch, glancing up often from our summertime reading.

GJ above Emerald Bay

Mr. Glad casually and calmly swam in the lake for ten minutes at a time, completely disguising the fact that it was cold — he estimated 60°.

I was content to wade fairly quickly out to a rock where I could sit and admire my manly husband, whom I compared to a younger, fatter guy who no sooner entered the lake than he headed right back to the dry sand moaning and sputtering and making a scene.

 
Bridges’ Gilia

The quaking aspen trees shaded our tent and made a lovely shadow picture on the roof in the mornings, and Indian Paintbrush flowers waved at the front door. Steller’s jays helped to wake us up early with their raspy voices.

Lake Tahoe lies at about 6,000 feet elevation, which makes for chilly nights and mornings, but a noontime picnic can be plenty hot if your site’s table is in the full sun.

We took a short hike to Eagle Lake, above Emerald Bay, and captured some wildflower images. The purpley one Pippin and I think is Bridges’ Gilia or Gilia leptalea, though it also seems to have a new and updated botanical name for some reason: Navarretia leptalea.

Photo by Mr. Glad

I especially liked to visit the beach at night when it was empty and the water was shimmering. Little waves were going blip-blip-swish on the sand, where by their tracks you could see that the geese had been the last creatures to go to their rest.

On the Way to Red Hill

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The Russian River

Mr. Glad and I took our friend from college days on a hike at the coast. Up from Shell Beach, near where the Russian River flows into the ocean and sea lions sleep in clusters on the sand, a trail winds toward Red Hill. We didn’t make it to the top of anything, and the fog would have obscured our view anyway. But the overcast skies made it easy to photograph flowers.


Before we got to the trailhead we stopped on the bluff north of the river and looked down on the pale shapes of the sea lions, with a bunch of dark birds nearby, cormorants perhaps.

The slopes were covered with lovely pink grass, which contrasted nicely with white yarrow, and with yellow and blue flowers, too.
The blooms of this unknown plant remind me of a bouquet of fat and curling pipecleaners. It liked to grow in the poison oak and brambles.
Rattlesnake Grass – Briza maximaRattlesnake Grass is darling. Plantations of the stuff hid in the pink grass. It occurred to me to take some home and send it in a box to a grandchild, and as it didn’t look endangered I had no qualms about stealing.  Indeed, just now I found that it’s not even native to California, and is on the list of invasive plants, though its invasion is termed “limited.”

The giant yellow lupine bushes that one often sees near the coast weren’t in bloom, but smaller and mostly blue ones
dotted the sides of the trail.

As we trotted along comfortably, the breeze blew warm, though the sun was obscured. Noises from the highway down below were muffled, and the wild rose hid herself among some dead branches.