Where to See the California Super Bloom

Spring is in full bloom in California (SoCal especially) and I am here for it! I grew up on the East Coast, so I start to miss having actual seasons. With a trip to Oak Glen, CA to see the Fall leaves, my birthday trip to Big Bear, CA (seeing real snow for the first time in eight years!) and now seeing flowers almost everywhere, it feels like I am really getting my seasons back! For those who don’t live in California, we basically get super blooms (an event where wildflowers are found a’plenty) on years that it rains a lot in the Winter. We definitely got a lot of rain this year. The last time we had a super bloom was Spring of 2017 (more on that below). Read on to find the best places to see flowers in abundance this Spring!

Walker Canyon near Lake Elsinore

Walker Canyon near Lake Elisnore is full of poppies right now! If you really want to feel like a true California native, be sure to check this one out and see our state’s national flower covering hills everywhere! Be sure to go soon, though, as reports are saying this will only last about one or two more weeks. This site was really magical. Honestly, I had never seen so many flowers in one place in my life before. It’s worth the hour and a half drive there from LA. Just check the “Lake Elsinore” and “Walker Canyon” geotags on Instagram and your feed will be filled with seas of orange! Below are some of my tips for getting the best out of your visit to Walker Canyon.

• Leave early in the morning to get there. Tom and I left my apartment at 6am and arrived around 7:30am. We might’ve gotten there around 7:15, but we had to pick up his brother first. At this time, the traffic wasn’t bad getting there, but we still had to park about a mile away from the start of the trail. If you aim to get there closer to 9, it’s going to be way more crowded. We left around 9:30am and there were way more people around and taking pictures, traffic was backed up, and people had to start parking in a far back lot (an even further walk than what we walked).
• Wear good shoes! I wore wedges (for photos of course) with every intention of bringing a spare pair for walking, but I totally forgot. It’s a pretty hard walk. The path is uneven hard dirt and it’s steep in some parts. Walking the mini paths around the flowers had rocks everywhere, which were harder to navigate around in wedges (my bad). My legs are still sore from simply just using all my muscle trying to balance for two hours.
• Respect the poppies. A lot of people are walking in the poppies for pictures. I tried to stick to existing thin dirt paths as to not crush flowers. One girl picked a poppy and was lectured by a nature conservationist who showed up a bit later.
• Don’t be afraid to break away from everyone else. You can find better photo ops and larger fields of undamaged flowers if you follow the less populated trails. Thanks to Tom’s brother Joey, we found one area with the most poppies we had seen all day. Tom and I walked down an area of thorny brush (instead of trampling through the flowers) and Tom cleared out some of the loose thorny brush while we crushed down the rest with our feet. Then we got a few photos in an empty dirt spot that was there. *Pro tip: Try to angle your camera with some poppies in the foreground so it looks like you’re sitting right in the middle of the field, even though you’re actually in a bit of a clearing.
• Know that poppies close up when they’re cold. When we got there at 7:30am, most of the poppies were closed. I’m glad we stayed for two hours, because closer to the time we left, the poppies were more open. We went on a sunny clear sky day, so that certainly helped the poppies warm up faster. Check the weather before you go!
• It’s very dog friendly! I didn’t bring Oliver, but feel free to bring your pupper.
• Finally, if you miss out on this one, you can always check out the Antelope Poppy Reserve. Their website says that their poppy bloom is expected to reach its full potential around late March to early April.

Joshua Tree National Park

Joshua Tree National park is another great one! I’ve listed another desert in bloom below (the Anza Borrego Desert), however, this one is likely to have more flowers. You can see a large array of wildflowers, including lupine. Lupine is a gorgeous purple flower that essentially makes me think of a fat lavender haha! I’ve included a closeup picture of lupine from my trip to Iceland below. Fun fact: Lupine flowers aren’t native to Iceland – they brought them over from California to help the Earth regrow after a volcano eruption, since these flowers help their surroundings bloom!

Carizzo Plain National Monument

Carizzo Plain National Monument is said to have a beautiful super bloom. Near San Luis Obispo and about a three hour drive from LA, you can expect to see plenty of yellow and purple wildflowers. I personally haven’t checked this one out for myself yet, but if you do your research, you’ll see that the 2017 super bloom did not disappoint. There still isn’t much word out there about a super bloom here in 2019, but last year, the bloom was best in April, so we can probably expect the same of this year. This website goes into detail of the best paths to take to check out the super bloom (written about the 2017 super bloom).

Anza Borrego Desert

The Anza Borrego Desert is beautiful, but honestly on the lower end of my list of must see’s. All of my photos above are from the 2017 super bloom. It’s about a 2.5 hour drive from LA. There are many flowers, more than I’ve seen in any desert, but I have to admit I was a bit mislead two years ago. I saw a Facebook event about the super bloom here and the cover photo was nothing but purple flowers covering the desert. The last picture in my lineup was the extent of purple flowers I saw. Not what I expected, but still beautiful! Below are some of my tips for this super bloom:

• There are plenty of trails, all with different kinds of flowers. Be sure to pick up a map from the Visitor’s Center! The open field of purple flowers was my favorite, because the backdrop of the mountains made it so much more gorgeous.
• Bring a lot of water! I wasn’t really thinking about this when I went. I brought one water bottle and ended up staying for 5 hours. I was so dehydrated by the time my friends and I were ready to go. It made the drive back more challenging for sure. Also bring plenty of sunscreen! We ended up having to buy some from one of the hotels in the area.
• Don’t bring your dog unless you have some really sturdy booties for them. I debated bringing Oliver, but I’m so glad I didn’t. There are loose cactus needles all over the ground! I set my purse down for a minute and when I picked it up, it picked up some cactus needles with it. My purse then transferred 5 needles into my hip and needless to say, that was not fun.
• You’ll see a good bit of wildlife here. We saw a bunch of bees, hummingbirds, and even one road runner! Cross that one off the bucket list!

Point Mugu State Park

Point Mugu State Park is another one I have yet to check out, but it’s high on my list! There are more poppies to be found here as well (they are California’s flower after all!), but you’ll see an array of other flowers as well that you may not see in other areas. This includes globe gilias and chocolate lilies, neither of which I’ve ever seen in person, so I’m excited to see them for myself. Located in Malibu, this is about a one hour drive from LA.

Carlsbad Flower Fields

If you’re not one who likes to leave things up to chance, or you’d rather see an array of flowers, Carlsbad Flower Fields is a great place to check out. Colors are abundant here! This is one I plan on checking out myself this weekend, so I’ll be sure to update this post with my own photos and more information afterwards. It’s about a two hour drive from LA, although, please note that you have to pay a fee to get in. Here are some tips and facts I gathered from the fields website:

• There are 50 acres of flowers!
• According to their website, the best time to visit is Mid-March to Mid-April.
• They offer tractor rides through the fields.
• You can even picnic there and make a day of it! On weekends, they do have food vendors in the area.
• The cost of admission is $18 for adults.

Have you checked out any super blooms yet? Which one are you dying to check out? Let me know in the comments below!