This is a trip report from a recent trip I took to Carrizo Plains National Monument. If you are not familiar with this park, it is located in Southern California, just west of exotic Bakersfield. It's quite a drive from Sacramento, at 5 hours. Most of the journey is on Interstate 5, so if you plan to go, I recommend some good music or someone with good conversational skills.
 

2016 wasn't a stellar bloom year for Carrizo Plains but flowers did make a showing, so this was a good opportunity to scout and familiarize myself with the location. I doubt I would make the 5 hour trip again unless there was a super bloom or I was driving through on my way to another location.
 

One thing I did enjoy about this location was the opportunity to do some panoramic shots. I also really appreciated the clouds making an appearance.
 

Goldfields in bloom across the valley
 

Another shot of Goldfields in vertical format
 

Goldfields swaying in the wind
 

I wanted to try a different shot of the flowers since macro shots weren't an ideal choice with the wind. If I had realized just how many rattlesnakes live in this park (I saw 3 later in the day), I probably wouldn't have lied down in a field of flowers to try this!
 

This was near the Soda Lake in the park. I liked the shape the clouds made - and the blue sky and yellow sea of flowers against each other.
 

More Goldfields! Lighting was tricky in this park because the direction I needed to shoot for the best views always seemed to be right into the sun. I did a fair amount of post processing to bring the highlights in the sky down while boosting the exposure in the flowers.
 

This is a shot of the Caliente Range in the late afternoon. Was it smart to walk through knee-high foxtails with rattlesnakes wandering about? Probably not.
 

The park has more than just wildflowers to offer. I visited two ranches while scouting for night shooting opportunities. This is one of the abandoned buildings on Van Matre Ranch.
 

Another shot from Van Matre Ranch.
 

This park attracts a lot of hunters and I saw bullet holes in nearly every man made object. I thought the pattern this one created was interesting.
 

While I was driving down the main road, it looked like a large section of the distant valley was blue. It was driving me crazy so I kept trying to find a road that would take me closer. I finally found one (and thank goodness for 4wd) and it turned out to be a large field of Phacelia. This is a mid-day shot while I was scouting. I decided to go back here for sunset. I am often amazed how the light changes things. I included a similar shot below where the sun is at a lower angle. Instead of being compressed and flat as in the image above, the mountains start to have a more three dimensional appearance.
 

I love the light at sunset. If you think about it, we only get about 28,750 opportunities to enjoy a sunset in our lives. I cringe when I think of how many of these that I have squandered. You've got to soak these up when you can!
 

Still hanging out amongst the Phacelia. It was amazingly quiet out here by this time. Although the park was quiet busy with visitors during the mid-day, by the time dinner time hit, they left me alone to work.
 

Last shot before the sun left for the day. There wasn't much color after this so I scarfed down dinner and prepped for my night shots.
 

While scouting for night shots, I decided this tractor was my top choice because I liked the yellow tractor against the blue sky, it was only about 100 feet from my vehicle, and there was no tall grass to wade through (remember the rattlesnakes?) I thought I had a pretty solid choice and I went into my night shot with confidence. Here's the thing though; the night before I left, World War Z was on TV. I only saw the first ~ 15 minutes but as soon as it got dark and weird noises started happening, all I could think about was zombies. I think I repeated "Zombies aren't real" in my head at least 50 times.
 

After I got my camera all set up and clicked on the remote shutter, I thought "I'm good, I'm going to go read a magazine for an hour while the camera shoots." I sauntered back to my truck and whipped out an issue of Outdoor Photographer magazine. An hour later, my timer went off and I walked back out to my camera to start the light painting portion of the shot. When I clicked the remote off, an image appeared on my LCD that looked a lot like my first test shot. I forgot all about zombies for a minute while I tried to figure out what happened. Then I realized, I forget to set my shooting mode to continuous, so I had only taken one shot over the course of an hour. Rookie move. I should have stayed there for a few minutes to make sure everything was good before I walked away. By this time, it was after 9:00 pm. I had been awake for 17 hours and I was pooped but I just couldn't walk away without trying for one decent night shot, so I set up the camera again, and waited several minutes to make sure it was firing. Then I walked back to the truck for an hour of self loathing. 
 

After another hour, I came back to 120 successful shots (continuous 30 second exposures for 60 minutes), and I started light painting. The night sky ended up being more orange than blue so I adjusted it in Photoshop to be closer to what I envisioned. Clouds drifted through the exposure too, which I hate, but I wasn't bit by a zombie so I'm just going to go ahead and be grateful.
 

The following morning's sunrise was decent but I didn't linger too long before I started making the 5 hour drive back home. I had chores to do after all.
 

I did like the way sunrise lit up this field of Goldfields though.
 

And, it was still enough to grab one macro shot before I headed home.
 

I'm not sure where my trip will be, but I'm excited for the next adventure!