We left Joshua Tree National Park and were still headed south in our quest to find spring. We were headed just about as far south as you can get without a passport, Anza Borrego State Park. At nearly 600,000 acres Anza Borrego is large for a state park, and overall it isn’t overly developed either. We were starting to see some wildflower reports so our timing was looking good.
Note: This story is part of the series South to Spring. Click the link or head to our timeline for the other chapters of the trip.
We started our exploration of the park with a drive down Grapevine Canyon. The hummingbird bush, or chuparosa, were in full bloom and were showing off their reds up and down the canyon. Signs of spring for sure.
Ocotillo put on it’s own fine show of red.
Before long we were on the desert floor and in the middle of grand cactus gardens.
We had read the day before that Henderson Canyon Road was the place to be if you really wanted to see the blooms. It was on the way to a potential campsite for the night, so away we went. Buffalo traffic jams are common in Yellowstone, we encountered our first wildflower traffic jam when we arrived at Henderson Canyon. It did seem that the wildflower viewers at least had the sense to pull off the road, more than I can say for the tourons of Yellowstone. The sandy flats along the road were indeed in full bloom.
There was only one problem. By the afternoon, the wind was whipping up so much dust we were wondering where we could spend the night to get out of it. Looking at the forecast, it wasn’t looking good. We headed up to higher country, not out of the wind, but out of the dust. It would be a windy night in the camper, and it was looking like the real wind, with gusts as high as 80 was still upcoming over the next two or more days. What to do? Where could we escape the wind for a few days? It appeared the entire region was going to have nearly unbearable wind for days. We settled into camp and started to review our options. We’d be off to somewhere new tomorrow, and just when we were finding spring.
