After spending a week skiing and generally hanging out in cold places, it was time to head south to visit family ... and the beach. The good part about not being able to go over 60 mph on the freeway is it doesn't make much difference if you take the slower highways, so I decided to get off the straight and boring Interstate 5 around Avenal and make my way through Carrizo Plain National Monument and then the Los Padres National Forest via Highway 33 to Ojai and eventually Ventura.

I initially got off I5 near Avenal because it seemed like it might have a quiet spot to post up for the night with decent cell reception so I could get lots of work done. I didn't see anything I liked and moments after I started on the 2-lane highway towards Avenal I was enveloped in fog so thick I could barely see the road. Not the sort of place to turn around while pulling a trailer.

Eventually, I found a quiet spot at the turnoff for Bitterwater Valley Road near Blackwells Corner. A nearby sign for the 'California Resources Company' gave me pause. It's always hard to tell how busy a place might be come morning. Sure enough, at about 7 am, the sound of trucks smashing the metal bars of the nearby cattle guard together made for jarring but effective alarm clock.

I had no real goal except to get to Ventura and eventually Leo Carrillo. Looking at the map, I saw the Carrizo Plain National Monument with a few interesting spots like Soda Lake and Trevor Ranch and a couple campgrounds. I'd never heard of the Carrizo Plain and I think it's more popular as a springtime superbloom destination, but I'm partial to visiting places in their off-season.

Carrizo Plain didn't disappoint, which was probably because I had no expectations. It was dry, empty and vast with a couple birds circling above the only sign of life. There's a couple abandoned ranches in the park, but they're not particularly old and don't look too different from houses just outside the park, except the ones outside the park have hand-scrawled no-trespassing signs and the kind of black plastic tarps that usually surrounds weed farms. And lots of Trump flags.

Most of the park doesn't have cell reception, but I got signal again near Trevor Ranch so I stayed there for the night. I would have explored a little more, but I was running low on gas so I didn't want to go too much out of my way. The roads were unpaved in for a few miles, but in good condition at the time. The next day, I continued on to Leo Carrillo, stopping for coffee in Ventura.

Carrizo Plain is a fascinating place, but it probably wouldn't appeal to most people unless there's a superbloom. It's a fun place to explore if you're not in a hurry and you're towing your house around though.