Central Valley

We have come to rest, at least for now, in the great central valley of California. Last night we spent at a pull out on a logging road on the way down out of the Sierra. No one went by all night.
Michael tried to process veggie oil near the library in Oakhurst but the highway patrol made a fuss about it being private property. We then moved on to Merced County and processed at a vista overlooking a drab wooded valley over the Chowchilla River.
The day was hot and the thin foothill soils are already browning.
Once in the valley, with its terrible air quality, we could see that the rich farmlands are filling up with human homes. Overcrowded dairies and chicken farms are spliced in with subdivisions. Farming and vineyard plots are shrinking too.
We headed for the closest green area on the map, where there is a National Wildlife Refuge and we pulled in by this canal for the night. The earthen canal, next to the one carrying water away to some urban elsewhere, is filled with heron and ducks, here by the ever busy highway. We know we may be kicked out. The fringe dwellers, the mobile homeless… there is so little open space left for people to just be for a night.
Of course, in California we’ve all had our trying times with tweekers and unstable people and litterers and scary people with mean dogs…we’re not much for trusting strangers. Still, when you are a peaceful wanderer, especially having come from a culture of other peaceful wanderers, you see it from another side.
Ah, the “golden rollin’ hills of California!” Here’s to our state flower and the beauty of her yearly appearance along the waysides! The thirsty reservoir is called San Luis.