Went for a glorious hike last month with my pal Wendy.
After about 2 hours of hiking in the hills above Poway,
we found a beautiful little trail we'd never been on before.
(So of course we headed right up it - we like to live life on the edge and all that...)
And in addition to being filled with the most beautiful wildflowers,
it was lush and green and had so many beautiful turns and twists - truly and amazing trail.
The wildflowers greeted us at every turn of the trail from Yucca to Poppies and everything in between!
This succulent was growing right out of a wall of rock!
This little plant's leaves were shaped like little bowls and were filled with the morning dew....
I've named it "Cereal Bowl Plant" (I'm oh SO creative, don't you think?)
And we found a MEADOW! Yep.
Just like they had on Little House on the Prairie.
(Can't you picture Laura and Carrie running along?)
Well sadly, two weeks after that hike, we took Betsy to the trail to show her
all the beautiful wildflowers and they were gone.
Dead. Dried up. Drought-ed. (Just invented that word)
Even the beautiful meadow was ugly....
WASHINGTON, Feb 21 (Reuters) - The historic U.S. drought of 2012 could spread this spring to more of California. They also projected a warmer-than-normal summer over almost the entire United States.
California has the greatest chance of abnormally dry weather, even though parts of California were just beginning to recover from drought at the end of last year. The northern half of the state had been mostly drought-free of late but now a drought seems likely to develop.
"They started out so well, in November and December they had really good strong rains, they had good snow packs in the Sierra Nevadas," Miskus told Reuters after the outlook's unveiling. "By February, however, conditions were dry, and this is typically California's wettest month," he said.
Last year's drought is second only to the Dust Bowl year of 1934 as the one with the most widespread and severe dry conditions in the United States. And 67 percent of the contiguous United States are dryer than normal, and some places are still experiencing exceptional drought.