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Wildflower Safaris: In the Desert in Early February

© Gregg Pasterick

We didn't expect to be leaving the Long Beach peninsula of Washington quite so soon. We didn't expect to be faced with the prospect of finding a new innkeeping gig this early in the year. And we certainly didn't expect to be heading back to Ohio, but all things considered, that seemed the thing to do.

My wife and I made a valiant attempt at making the most of this change in the wind, and we headed south, in to California, making for the desert southwest, hoping for some wildflowers. That is I was hoping for wildflowers; my wife was hoping I wouldn't be too depressed by not seeing any.

But we did see wildflowers, beginning with Gorse and Scotch Broom in Oregon, and then several mustard species, fiddleneck, popcorn flower, a few poppies and lupine driving down the guts of California. And then we got down near Joshua Tree and Twentynine Palms and we began seeing desert species. It wasn't a rainbow, or an extravagant desert garden, but it was a colorful sign of life here and there in the form or purple locoweeds and verbenas.

And then the colorful signs of life began to flourish along I-10 as we drove past Palm Springs.

First it was a bit of Coulter's lupine here, and a bit of Coulter's lupine there. Then it was more Coulter's Lupine. And then it was more Coulter's lupine with a sudden burst of bushy encelia species. I'm not sure which species, but it turned into a bright yellow shrubbery lining the highway with pockets of purple pink lupine mixed in.

Everything turned sherbet-orange and lavender-pink as dusk swept across the desert. It was dark by the time we pulled into Blythe, California for the night.

Back on the road early the next morning, we drove past a patch of one of those desert evening primroses as we got on the highway. The seemed a good sign.

We got into southwestern Arizona in no time, and the desert garden along I-10 seemed to be at its peek. The yellow explosion of encelia was blinding, the purple pink Coulter's Lupine continued the highlight the yellow, as well as a bit of orange-red desert mallow and the rich purple of Arizona Lupine. The highway was lined with rainbows.

By the time we got to Saguaro National Park in Arizona there were a few blooms scattered about: orange poppies, purple-blue lupines, blue, blue Desert Canterbury Bells. And that was pretty much it as far as wildflowers; the giant Saguaro cacti wouldn't be in bloom for another couple months.

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