California poppies mean Spring! Combined with purple lupines, the mountainsides are a delight to behold. These poppies are in the local botanical garden, but they can show up anywhere. They vary from deep orange to yellow, some with orangey streaks in the center of their golden petals.
Poppies are the California state flower, harbingers of Spring, and something I look forward to every year.
Friday, about two weeks after our first significant rains of the season, a friend and I spent the day outdoors, most of it at Figueroa Mountain, outside Santa Ynez, California, off the 154 highway. Poppies were larger at lower elevations, in bright spots, but up higher, they were more rare, and shorter, but just as beautiful. In a few weeks, the flowers should be quite lovely, careening off the mountainsides.
In the lower elevations, the poppies are beginning to bloom. Always a sign of spring in California!
Ink, Yarn & Beer 