About Face!

Sorry about the bit of silence as of late!  Unfortunately for us, our time at the desert has been cut short.  Business obligations have prompted us to drive back to our home town of Nevada City, California.  We use the term home town loosely of course, as we no longer have any obligation to it as “home”.  Rather, a large number of friends and contacts live there, so we still have some ties to the area.  Home, of course, is where we park it, Anywhere U.S.A.

Leaving memories of abundant sunshine...

We drove up from Palm Springs starting late in the afternoon on a spur of the moment decision.  I drove well into the night, plotting my route by the rest stops going up Highway 5.  I drove till I couldn’t take it anymore, then pulled into the rest stop South of Los Banos, California.  The rest stops on Highway 5 are very busy, and filled with truckers at night time.  They feel safe considering the amount of traffic going in and out, but they’re noisy!  Other more remote rest stops may not be a good choice, as I’ve heard bad things about the dangers of staying in them.  We passed out around 1:30 a.m, then got up around 6:00a.m. and took off.

Shock and Awe?!?

Nightmare visions of the "home" town filled my head...

We arrived in Nevada City to the greetings of a major storm.  We were getting used to the desert climate where it may cloud up and threaten to rain, then only releasing a few drops was nice.  Not so here, rain nonstop and COLD!  Please don’t let it snow!  One minute your pores are used to being wide open, and the next clamped down tight.

The weather coming back this quickly, has been quite the contrast.  We were getting used to dwelling in the 70’s-90’s consistently, wearing tank tops and shorts daily, or even less.  The desert was everything we heard about as far as climate in the winter months.  I think everyone in North America, should abandon the cold, barren Northern areas and head to the southern areas of California, Arizona, Texas, Florida and the like.  Lack of vitamin D in winter is a real problem.  For an added bonus, we could all coordinate planting projects down South perhaps starting on the “public lands”, but that’s a whole different series of posts…

Independence Trail Parking, I like that name...

April is always a dicey month as far as inclement weather up here.  The recent  forecast is changing though, with the weather clearing at least a few days and the highs climbing into the 70’s.  Perhaps it’ll be warm enough to do some dunking in the ice cold Yuba River.  That is something we’ve been missing, the abundance of wild water to jump in and cleanse off the old dirty, mis-aligned aura.

Fast Forward

Independence Trailhead...

The promise of warm weather was true!  First on the agenda was to go check out the conditions at the south Fork Yuba River.  I started the day with a run at the Independence Trail for old times’ sake.  We’ve been living in this area for years so know it real well, almost too well.  I find that if you dwell in one place too long, especially immersed in routine, you can begin to go numb to the beauty over time.

The South Yuba almost feels like home...

The South Fork Yuba though, is just as we left it, exceedingly beautiful, life giving and refreshing as ever, even through these jaded eyes.  After the run, I hiked up the river to one of my favorite hangouts and proceeded to get into my birthday suit to prepare myself psychologically for a polar bear dunk or two or three.  Mind you, the water temperature is pretty cold right now, like numb in 15 seconds, as its coming down from the snow capped Sierra Nevada’s above.  A couple of dunks later and some potent sunshine set things better than new!  The mental lift never fails to amaze me, thus the power of some full bodied Sun, some Air circulation from running, and some cleansing wild water!

Time to dunk and revive!

Onwards and Upwards

We had initially planned on staying in the desert until May, but still have some obligations in our lives, but no complaints overall.  Looks like further travels will be from up North for now.  We anticipate the snow melts and plan to fallow them up in elevation landing in the upper Sierras for the warm summer months.  Stay tuned…

Tags: Sierras, wild water