Are you ready for the ultimate national park-adox? Death Valley brought us back to life!

We took a much needed retreat to the hottest, lowest place in North America over the last weekend of February (‘22) and came away with a whole different perspective on one of the country’s most often overlooked national parks. This was our first trip to a national park of the year, and now that James is back to his fully capable ambulating we were finally able to get out on the trails a bit, too. Late winter/early spring is an ideal time to go to the Valley, as you’ll be able to avoid the 1. heat and 2. crowds, but you’ll also have a chance to 3. see the flowers in full bloom before the deathly heat comes to fry them in their place.

National ParksM+J AwayMarch 2, 2022M+J Awaydeath valley, californiaComment

Doing the Southern Sierras Right: Our Winter Weekend in Sequoia National Park

This may be hard to believe, but our second date was an overnight scamper to the nearby, towering mountains and forests of Sequoia National Park. As far as dating is concerned, we set a pretty high bar for ourselves with this one. But why not head to the woods to up the ante from date number one? When you’re both in love with getting away to bathe in the forests, and it just so happens to be a short (for us) three and a half hour drive from our meetup spot at the Wal-Mart in Santa Maria, there’s almost no better way to find out how the other person adapts to sleeping in the back of a Subaru. When the car camping just so happens to be set in one of the world’s most picturesque locations in the world, that’s an entirely different set of circumstances, of course. So let’s get into that part of the date.

m+j away