Southern California

29th April - 7th May 2006

Introduction

The Southern California area has a wealth of great places for viewing wildlife only a relatively short distance from the vast urban sprawl of the Los Angeles and San Diego areas. On this trip, since it was during the spring migration period, I mainly concentrated on visiting desert oases, but also included a couple of coastal and montane sites in the itinery for a bit of variety.

Below is a rough, hand-drawn, clickable map of all the places I visited on this trip. Each link will take you to a page outlining the key points of interest and illustrated with photos taken at that location. Some places were obviously better for photography than others and this is reflected in the number of photos on each page.

1. Joshua Tree National Park

6. Picacho State Recreation Area & Mitry Lake

2. Big Morongo Canyon Preserve

7. San Diegiuto River Park

3. San Jacinto Mountain

8. Tucker Wildlife Sanctuary

4. Anza-Borrego Desert State Park

9. Santiago Oaks Regional Park

5. Salton Sea National Wildlife Refuge