Last week I snowshoed to Granite Flat, a favorite campground near our home. It’s hard to find an open site in the summer, but this time of year, I had the whole campground to myself, even on a Saturday. The campground lay quiet under an 8-foot blanket of snow. Just this last summer we held a family reunion there, and even though there wasn’t another sole around me, I could hear the echoes of my children and grandchildren laughing and playing. We’re anxious for the winter to pass and the opportunity to once again be on the open road, traveling with our trailer, and seeing the wide world before us. It isn’t just winter per se that ties us down. True, it is harder to camp in the winter, but it can be done and there are places to go where there isn’t snow. It’s more that my job is always busiest at this time of the year. It won’t be long however, before my employment ends and the nomad life begins in earnest.

We have loose plans in the next month. Spring is when the wildflower bloom begins. Already, the southern California desert is showing signs of a good year ahead. We can’t make concrete plans to travel because the timing of the bloom is never exact, nor does it occur everywhere at once. We have to play by ear and be prepared to jump in the car at a moment’s notice. There are still some variables ahead that could affect the bloom. About three or four years ago a phenomenal bloom was forecast for the Antelope Valley Poppy Reserve in California. And then blistering hot temperatures cooked the young seedlings. Within a week, the entire season was a bust and the bloom nearly non-existent.

This posting will be brief this week. I don’t have a lot to say about Granite Flat. I’ve changed my approach to preparing my blog posts. I used to shoot, edit the photos, and write the post all in the same weekend. It was hard to find the time to be out on a Saturday shooting and edit the photos for my self-imposed deadline of Sunday evening when I send out the post. The last few weeks I’ve edited the photos during the week and write my essay on the next weekend. This gives me a lot more time to spend with the images with less pressure. This weekend I’m in southern Utah again. I spent this afternoon in Zion National Park. I’ll share those images with you next week.