Page:The Tourist's California by Wood, Ruth Kedzie.djvu/54

34 THE TOURIST'S CALIFORNIA a wind purely local: perhaps dependent on the configuration of the glen." San Mateo County, which receives the brunt of the Pacific winds, has the same thermal average as a section in the extreme north of the State, where- as other Bay Counties, protected in their position, share the balm of the Sacramento Valley. One may emerge with his skis from the Yosemite to gather orange blossoms 80 miles away at the Merced end of the Valley Railroad ; descend from the snows of Shasta to camp in the open at its feet. California is loveliest at " that favoured mo- ment in the year when the rains are ovef and the dusty summer has not yet set in." By the end of February the air is tempered by the touch of spring. Billows of wild flower-colour begin to spread and deepen across the landscape, fording canyadas, surging up mountain-slopes, flooding the valleys with a torrent of hues. . . . By June the country-side has assumed the bronze and yel- low garments of summer ; her tints fade into those of the short autumn " when the brown hills and purple mountains are waiting for the rain clouds."