Ninety-nine percent of those who visit Big Sur probably do nothing more than drive down the coast highway, stop at a few turnouts to snap a few pics of the scenery and their travel partners, grab a mediocre lunch at a tourist spot, then turn around and go home. But we few and proud who get off the beaten track, park our car on the highway for three days and walk away from it, into the steep, dark, forested mountains – we know that there’s so much more.

The past few years of drought have been tiresome where the four of us are from in Southern California – where spring has been cut short by the lack of rain, and water sources that are supposed to be perennial have completely dried up, severely limiting when and where we can comfortably hike and camp.  So driving a few hours north allowed us a brief reprieve from all that. In Big Sur, at least, the rivers still flow, and the hills are green and festooned with wildflowers, and the titanic redwoods, centuries-old, seem not the least bit disturbed.  And even better, everyone we encountered on the trail seemed so happy – especially the handsome rangers we encountered making repairs to the windswept lookout tower atop Cone Peak! Everyone was happy that spring was springing in all its glory, and everyone seemed happy to share it with friends old and new.

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