Leon Turnbull Photography

Spring is definitely in the air here. The rain is gone. The sun is out. The flowers are blooming. I do not think I have heard the following words/phrases at all this year in California: “drought”, or “water restrictions”. And yet, as of March 1, we were only at 90 percent of normal snowpack, according to the DWR. With no more rain on the horizon this month (it seems), we will probably end up being right around average for the year. Folsom Lake is currently 50 percent full, and when the snow melts (and it is definitely melting right now), then it will fill up, so we will certainly be okay for this year. However, considering it is an El Nino year, one would have expected (and hoped) that our snowpack this year would be very well above average. That just did not happen. It will be another short waterfall season here, this spring, I think.

And yet, because our precipitation this year was well spread out over the winter, it looks like it is going to be a very good year for wildflowers in California. Spectacular, even.

This is a shot of some of those pretty flowers on Table Mountain in Oroville. And a waterfall in the background to boot. Is that sweet or what?

The waterfall is Hollow Falls, one of the many on Table Mountain, and one of five I got to on this day. I had not been to Hollow Falls before, and it is a pretty nice one. You can even get down to the bottom of it fairly easily.

The flowers on Table Mountain were just starting to come out when I was here (that was a couple weeks ago, now they are probably quite nice). The one exception to this, however, was right at Hollow Falls, where I saw these really nice ones. I tried to get a shot of them with the waterfall in the background. I am rather fond of this one.