Rancho Santa Margarita Homes & Lifestyles

The weather was beautiful yesterday and I decided to take a walk along the arroyo that runs up the east side of Antonio Parkway. Rancho Santa Margarita has some of the best walking trails around and the community was out in full measure enjoying them. Young couples with strollers, the usual group of iPod-immersed joggers, a couple of adolescent skaters, an elderly woman with her basset hound, and me - all out taking advantage of the ideal Southern California spring weather.

Rancho Santa Margarita is a successful master-planned community with the structure of an urban village. Take a look at one of my previous posts: Rancho Santa Margarita At A Glance . RSM was designed in such a way to encourage residents to interact socially - and they do! Friendly - that’s how people are here in Rancho Santa Margarita - and it makes one’s outside exercise regime fun.

This time of the year plant-life is typically in a phase of renewal. Spring rains bring fresh new life to the water-starved vegetation. Wild grasses seem to grow practically overnight and the arroyo becomes awash in a sea of color and new wildlife. Today the native shrubbery carpeting the steep sides of the arroyo is a dingy tannish-brown and is dry and brittle. I admit it still holds a certain appeal, but it doesn’t hold a candle to the beauty of the arroyo on a typical spring day.

Wildlife is abundant in the arroyo and it is advised that residents stay on the trails at all times. This is especially true at dusk. The arroyo is home to dozens of varieties of snakes and rattlesnake encounters are a fairly common occurrence for those who wander off the trail. This time out I see only birds - but I do hear a rustle or two in the bushes.

As the shadows lengthen and the sun makes it’s slow decent into the Pacific I take one final glance at the arroyo. Springtime in the arroyo is typically the most beautiful period of the cycle. This year’s drought conditions have definitely taken their toll.

The arroyo remains incredibly dry and the typical spring rebirth seems to have been put on hold by unspoken order of Mother Nature. Fresh meadow grasses and wild flowers struggle to survive without the benefit of rainfall. Even the indigenous shrubs, with their ability to survive in the dry, warm Southern California foothills, appear to be starved for water.

This is part of the Southern California cycle and this season will no doubt have an extraordinary number of Red Flag Fire Warning days. Some years in California are much drier than others and this is definitely one of those years.

*Modified post from kellykilpatrick’s.wordpress.com*

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