My journey to the mountains took me more than eight hours, owing to the search for a fruit stand on the way. I followed several Google leads to popular stores where I might pick up peaches and a watermelon and other items close to the farm, just before leaving California’s gloriously productive Central Valley. This project led me out of my way and brought me to destinations along county highways with nary a turnout where I could imagine a fruit stand ever having existed.

In frustration and great disappointment I resigned myself to having to buy the produce at the last good grocery store further along my way in the lower mountains. But I prayed as I headed back toward the correct route, “Maybe, Lord, you could lead me to a fruit stand that Google doesn’t know about.”

And there, “in the middle of nowhere,” south of Madera in an area called Trigo on the map, I saw the sign that read, “PEACHES APRICOTS CORN” — It was a real place, not a mirage, a tiny outpost with a nice lady who helped me load my box of treasures into the car. I’m certain that as my happiness turned into enthusiasm and then extravagance, I bought way too much for Kate’s family and me to eat — I will probably need to make a pie or soup up here to use it all.

Then, as drove off and headed up through the sandy blond, hay colored foothills, baking under the midday sun, I calmed down and fully entered the experience of the rising elevation and of leaving that everyday world behind. No need for a map, because I know the way.

After the expanse of golden hills comes the area where orchards of date palms grow, and then the miles of oak forests, after which the climb gets steeper, and the foliage denser. There are the elderberries in bloom, waving their flowers in the breeze, and huge bushes of lupines growing on the banks and reaching out with loaded purple stems.

The goldenrod is spreading its gold across the meadows, and a certain elegant grass grows alongside. The Grand Mountain Dandelion is at its puffiest, and smaller puffs on the wild buckwheats refuse to pose for a photo but prefer dancing in the wind.

In spite of my dawdling along the way to say hello to these old friends, I made it to the lake and the cabin well before dark and was welcomed by my sister and her husband.

I slept very well, they went home this afternoon, and tomorrow the rest of my group will arrive. I’m in the High Sierra and feel on top of the world.