I spent springtime researching Provence and the Côte d’Azur for a new book, getting lost on back roads as often as time allowed. As a travel journalist, I rarely have time to linger at the most beautiful places I’m paid to cover.  So I snap pics to remind myself where I’d like to return, once I’m no longer on deadline.

The Luberon Mountains, just after a driving rain. The clouds broke and a rainbow exploded over the vineyards of Joucas. This is the land that Peter Mayle fetishized in A Year in Provence.
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It’s the emerald month in California. While most of America waits for spring’s first crocuses to pop through mud and snow, California glows electric green everywhere you go—everywhere except the Sierra, which are buried beneath 15ft of white. Where to head now? Anywhere. Get in the car and drive, preferably through the foothills of the Sierra (where this picture was taken),  but even I-5 looks fantastic in March.

Lake Tahoe Winking Through the Trees

The skiing in the Sierra this season has been epic, and the current series of cold storms means the snow will last well past April. Horizon Air started new service to Mammoth Lakes from LAX and SJC, shortening the 7-hour drive from the Bay Area to a mere 45 minutes, meaning you can ski California’s top ski mountain the same day you arrive. My top pick for Tahoe this season has been Alpine Meadows, where powder stashes remain days after a storm. Tip: If you’re an expert, find the Palisades—that’s Tahoe winking at you through the trees.

Forgive my silence: I’ll be in Provence and the Côte d’Azur for the spring, researching a new book for Lonely Planet. If I have time, I’ll update you on what’s happening on the French Riviera—with any luck, I’ll be typing from a yacht in St-Tropez. Regardless, I’m back in May. See you on the road, if not the Mediterranean.

God, she has a gorgeous voice. Though Carole Whitelock sat in-studio at ABC Adelaide, and I on headsets at ABC in Sydney, she instantly became my new best friend as we spoke, 850 miles distant, during this live radio interview last July in Australia. Isn’t it funny how you can meet a total stranger, and feel you’ve known her you’re entire life? Have a listen, and you’ll hear what I mean.

My second worldwide-television debut happened first in India, and I couldn’t help but wonder, Had anyone watched me on TV through the window of an electronics store? If so, I wish I could tell them that I was watching them back (Hello from California!). What they saw: Madagascar, through my eyes. Have a look.

No script, no hair, no makeup, no wardrobe—Lonely Planet: Roads Less Travelled turns conventional travel-television on its head. My only directive as host was to be my “weird, wacky, unfiltered San Francisco self.” What else could I be? To those who write me and ask, How can I get your job? I say this: Leading an authentic life pays off. The show is airing now on National Geographic Channels International, in 40 countries around the globe.

In Madagascar last week, the director of the TV show I’m co-hosting for NatGeo asked me what I most missed about California after an arduous month on the road, and what I was looking forward to eating once I got home. Tomatoes, I said. It’s tomato season in California.

Travel in Madagascar is hard—very hard. To get anywhere remote requires hours of four-wheel-driving, down rutted-out muddy roads intended for ox carts, not motor vehicles. But the payoff is huge. I attended a circumcision festival in a tiny mountain village, after which the boys’ grandfathers each ate the foreskin—with a banana. (Yes, you read that right.) Then came the savika, an afternoon of bull-wrestling; I participated and cracked a rib.

To wrestle a 2000-pound Malagasy zebu bull, you sneak up beside the animal, grab the giant hump behind its neck, and hang on tight as the bull whips around in circles, trying to buck you off. Twice the bull paused, cocked its head to look me straight in the eyes, then—wham!—whacked me right under the armpit with its giant horn. Then it spun around again. And again. I only let go once the rodeo master looked truly terrified for my welfare. Later I found out I was the first-ever Westerner to have participated in this savika, and all the men of the village shook my hand. It still hurts to laugh ten days later.

Madagascar’s real mind-blower is the “turning of the bones” ceremony, when families exhume their dead ancestors to worship them, and give thanks for the blessings they have bestowed from the spirit world. Then the families rewrap the bones—as matter-of-factly as if they were changing bed linens—and pop them back into underground tombs, which I was invited to explore by candlelight. My host gleefully exclaimed, “That’s my grandmother! That’s my uncle and my aunt!” I tripped over a sack of bones and jumped backward in horrified embarrassment, hitting my head on the tomb’s low rock ceiling. Far from gloomy, it was a great party, more like a wedding than a funeral, with much dancing to accordion music and drinking of gasoline-like rum. It’s called the Famadihana, and families celebrate it every seven years. Few Westerners have seen it, but you will—at least on TV.

The television series is called, Lonely Planet: Roads Less Travelled, a 13-episode package of hour-long shows to broadcast this fall on National Geographic Adventure. Check out the trailer for the series’ debut, me in Morocco. The show airs in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Australia and Latin America (dig the Spanish trailer)—-basically everywhere except the US and the UK until sometime in 2010. Which is fine by me. I’m not convinced I want to appear on American television and lose the anonymity that permits me to remove my clothes at San Francisco street parties. There’s a reason you never spot celebs at the Folsom Fair.

BBC Worldwide holds distribution rights, once the series initially airs on NatGeo, so you’ll eventually catch it somewhere. Maybe on BBC America, or Discovery Channel, or maybe on the in-flight entertainment system of your next swank voyage aboard Virgin Atlantic. And p.s. if you are planning a far-flung journey in the near future, read my tips for arriving fresh, following an 18-hour flight.

Mark your calendar: Plan a weekend daytrip to Marin before July 12th to see newborn Snowy Egrets and Great Blue Herons at Audubon Canyon Ranch, in West Marin. After Sunday, July 12, the ranch closes for summer, so the fledgling birds can find their wings in peace.

Show your children these magnificent winged creatures, and watch their eyes light up. Then tell them how this ranch is the reason there’s not a freeway up the Marin-Sonoma coast.

Test

Governor Schwarzenegger has proposed closing 200 California state parks—that’s 80% of our park system. We can stop him, but must act fast. On Tuesday, June 2, the legislature’s budget conference committee will consider this proposal. Contact your state rep now.

If the parks close, they’ll get trashed—there’s no way to stop determined people from breaking into an open space. The existing threats are bad enough, but if this goes through, vandalism will be rampant and the threat of wildfires will increase exponentially, as unmonitored trespassers will inevitably light campfires. Extra and expensive law enforcement will be required in the long run. Then if the parks ever reopen, there will be huge clean-up costs. It’s far easier to maintain something than it is to clean it up. Take action now.

Parents need inexpensive places to take kids—especially during recessions—and state parks provide an invaluable educational and cultural resource. It costs $354 for a family of four to visit Disneyland for a single day. It costs $5 for a state park. The parks also draw overseas visitors, who inject vast sums into our broader economy.

There is a solution. A $10 vehicle-licensing fee would raise $282 million for the parks. In exchange, the public gets free access to all state parks. This had been proposed by retired legislator John Laird, but Don Perata killed it. Take a look at the last year’s plan: it’s time to resurrect it. Contact your state representative now.

The land belongs to the people. Stand up and claim what is ours. In the wise words of Joni Mitchell, you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone. Let’s not find out.

For more on the story, check out what Frommer’s has to say, based on my report on 71miles.com.

Tioga Pass Road over Yosemite’s high country is open for the season. I shot these images at this time last year, a couple days after the road had reopened, while en route to Mammoth Lakes. If you’ve never taken this drive, start planning—it’s one of the most spectacular in all California.

The beauty shots begin in the foothills along Hwy 120, east of ugly Oakdale (the last chance for reasonably priced gas). Spring’s green grass has lately turned the color of lion’s fur, the color of summer. Century-old oaks dot hillsides where sheep and cattle graze—an image straight out of Virgil’s Eclogues.

The thing about the Sierra’s west slope is, you never know how high you’ve ascended until you reach an overlook, like this one, far above the Tuolumne River canyon. So subtle is the western rise, the only way to clock elevation change is to track the flora: oaks yield to pines, brown grass yields to green. Then you top out, the sky opens up, and distant blue ridgelines come into view.

Granite, trees, and water—the hallmarks of the Sierra. Now within the boundaries of Yosemite National Park, I pull off at mileage-marker 11 on Tioga Rd. Yosemite Creek cascades over granite slabs, bound for Yosemite Falls, the world’s fifth highest waterfall. Lying on a log wedged across the middle of the creek, I close my eyes and let the water’s roar surround me.

At Olmstead Point (mileage-marker 37), I skitter up a granite slab, sit tucked against a wind-gnarled foxtail pine, and watch the shadows play on Half Dome. The chiaroscuro of late-afternoon on the Sierra Crest is mesmerizing. After hurtling at break-neck pace across California, it takes time to apprehend such vastness, to expand my mind to accommodate grandeur. Yosemite is like that, mind-altering…trippy.

Tuolumne Meadows lies brown and muddy. The wildflowers have not sprung—summer comes late at 8800ft above the sea. Were it August, I’d scamper up Lembert Dome and watch the late-day sun paint the meadow orange. Instead I press on toward Tioga Pass—the highest stretch of pavement in all California—and plunge 3000 feet in 10 short miles toward Mono Lake. I’ll tell you more about that in a coming post.

If You Go: Staying in Yosemite Valley is the obvious choice. I recommend a simple rustic cabin with bath at Curry Village. Most rooms at the generic-motel-style Yosemite Lodge overlook a parking lot, but they have more amenities than Curry Village. The Ahwahnee is one of America’s great national park lodges; even if you don’t stay here, come for lunch in the grand dining room (dinner is overpriced). The Victorian-style Wawona Hotel feels like an old New England inn, but it’s far from Tioga Rd. The secret to scoring a room on short notice at all in-park properties is to telephone multiple times per day and ask about cancellations. You’d be amazed how often rooms open up. Alternatively stay at Evergreen Lodge, a compound of smartly decorated woodsy cabins near Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. I l-o-v-e this place.

California wildflowers are in full bloom. Thanks to March’s torrential rains, this spring’s flower season is turning out to be one of the best in years. Up and down the state, the land is electric green, dotted with swaths of orange, white, purple and yellow flowers—even I-5 looks gorgeous right now. But hurry—in just a few short weeks, the hills will turn the color of lion’s fur, the color of summer. I’ll be overseas, but if I were home, here’s what I would do this April:

Trek the Marin Headlands for spectacular displays of bright-orange California poppies, clinging to the rocks above the crashing surf. On weekdays, when crowds are few, hike Tennessee Valley. On weekends, head to Gerbode Valley. Dogs are allowed on some trails. Read more.

Hike Table Rock Trail, in Robert Louis Stevenson State Park. The views of Napa Valley from Mount St Helena may be prettier in autumn when the vineyards change color, but springtime puts the beauty right at your feet. Literally. Look for purple lupine and popcorn flower poking up through the lush grass. The 2.2mi (one-way) trek begins at the south-summit parking area, off Hwy 29, north of Calistoga.

Bite into the season’s first ruby-red strawberries at Swanton Organic Berry Farm, on the San Mateo Coast. Pick your own—a great Saturday activity with the kids—or buy a basket at the old-fashioned self-service stand, which also carries homemade pies, strawberry lemonade, and terrific preserves. Swanton is the ideal stopover after a day exploring the beaches of the San Mateo Coast, or while driving northward from Santa Cruz on Hwy 1.

Spot newborn snowy egrets in the treetops of the Audubon Canyon Ranch. One of the Bay Area’s most sublime natural wonders, hundreds of egrets and great blue herons are courting and nesting in the treetops of the Audubon Canyon Ranch, in West Marin. If you’ve never seen these magnificent birds up close, now’s your chance. Read more.

I’ll be back in the States this May. Till then, happy travels! —John