The Things Left Behind: Overlanding Carrizo Plain and Prewitt Ridge

The Things Left Behind: Overlanding Carrizo Plain and Prewitt Ridge

By Armando Ortiz

This late March, we took a weekend trip to Carrizo Plain National Monument and drove to Big Sur to take a road up to Prewitt Ridge. The journey was enjoyable, but it also left me thinking about the people who had passed through these places long before us.

We left Los Angeles, taking I-5 north all the way up to Highway 166. In Maricopa we filled up on gas, food and firewood. Arriving at Carrizo Plain, the landscape was opposite of what it had been during our January visit. A series of storms had passed through then, leaving the road muddy, and the hills lush green. We visited Painted Rock, whose pictographs made the site feel less like an outcrop and more like a sacred chapel. This time the flowers had faded, the grass was turning gold, and we planned to explore deeper into the monument.

Countless tiny painted lady butterflies fluttered and zigzagged along the edge of the road. The rising dust behind the truck created a huge adobe plume. We arrived at Selby Campground to find it packed, and the only spot we found was littered with evidence of those who had stayed before us. The scattered artifacts included unfinished chicken wings, pistachio shells and fruit peels. A half full champagne bottle lay beside the brush. For a moment I wondered what people thousands of years ago left behind– milled grains, paint containers, water jugs or clay shards. It was too much to clean and the cell phone connection was a bit precarious. We turned back. On Caliente Mountain Road we stopped at a place we had visited on our last trip. This time we arrived earlier, the weather was warmer, and there was more daylight. 

We pulled out our hiking gear and headed to a cluster of weathered boulders that looked promising for signs of earlier visitors- like mortars, petroglyphs or pictographs. She didn’t feel safe, and turned around to wait for me in the truck. The trail I followed had become visible after a late Summer fire swept through the area a few months earlier. Broken sea-green glass and empty aluminum cans littered the trail. Last time, I’d found the weathered backbone of a deer. Going down the trail was exciting, though not without caution. 

The boulders were surrounded with knee high grass. I hiked down and explored one of the boulders. The thought of ticks and snakes made me walk cautiously. Climbing around the boulder, I discovered traces of pictographs tucked into an alcove a few feet above the ground, and immediately found myself wondering what those symbols once meant. To a person today, the eroding images might just be drawings or vandalism, but to the people that once walked through here and called it home it might have meant something deeper. I stood before a place shaped by people whose purposes I could only guess at. Like them, I was merely passing through. I climbed back wondering what the symbols once meant to them. We continued our ascent on our overlanding expedition. 

We kept climbing past scattered campers before deciding to stop at a turn out. The Caliente Mountain peaks were behind us and before us were the ridges of the Temblor Mountains on the other side of the great Carrizo Plain valley. The hills everywhere were becoming golden tan with patches of green. The wind was just right. Beneath a juniper’s shade we ate lunch while she caught up with her family and I finished Elmore Leonard’s Out of Sight. After a while we pitched our tent, and lit a fire on the portable pit. We saw the constellations emerge from the night, and marveled at the sky till we were too tired.

These are the moments that make sleeping outdoors memorable. We rose early and watched the first rays of sunlight pierce the distant Temblor Mountains, their warm glow gradually bringing colors and shadows into focus across a landscape that stretched far beyond the horizon.

In the distance, a line of hikers wound across the mountainside before coiling in a circle. From afar it almost looked like prayer. As we packed up cars began passing by. The winds were calm so clouds of dust were almost nonexistent.

After oatmeal and hot coffee, we followed the dirt road back to Soda Lake Road and headed north to Highway 58. Our next destination was Prewitt Ridge – a coastal mountain top. We crossed undulating hills decorated with old oaks and rows of vineyards. We stopped at Paso Robles to refuel and stock up on snacks. Good music and the chaparral landscape gave the drive classic California road trip vibes.

From Paso Robles we climbed through Fort Hunter Leggett and into the Santa Lucia Range. Along the way, we stopped to take pictures and scout campsites for a future visit. Oak groves eventually gave way to a sun-baked scenery of burned pines and sycamores before we reached the turnoff to Prewitt Ridge.

The road wound through a blackened landscape before opening onto a mountain top crowned with a few weathered and gnarled trees. This was the place I had imagined reaching for years, long before I ever bought my truck. A puffy white blanket of fog covered the coast. Above it, the sun was bright, and the coastal breeze nearly perfect.

We ate lunch overlooking the coast as waves crashed below and trucks and SUVs came and went. Some travelers lingered to camp while others stopped only long enough for a photograph. The place felt larger–and more magical than it ever appeared in pictures. After we finished we drove back to the main road. Once down the mountain it was all coastal driving.

As we approached PCH, a layer of grey mist engulfed us, transforming the coastline into something that resembled a Chinese ink painting by Zhang Daqian. Through the fog we occasionally heard the crash of waves. A single coastal cypress stood nearby, an ancient warrior in a long battle against wind and time. Following the curves we drove by Plaskett Creek. A bit past Piedras Blancas Lighthouse we stopped to admire elephant seals who were sunbathing. By evening we reached Moonstone Beach and settled for the night.

Despite lasting two nights, the trip felt far larger than its time suggested. The next morning we walked all along the Moonstone Beach boardwalk where we saw pelicans glide over waves, while seagulls rested on island rocks. Next we explored Fiscalini Ranch Preserve where we discovered more evidence of those who lived here long before us. Mortar rocks with million dollar views of the ocean and coast lay exposed among the grass. I thought of the people that had walked this land long before we did and wondered how far they walked before reaching their place of sleep. Standing there among the mortar rocks, the coast, the mountains, the human artifacts, and even the dust trails behind passing trucks all felt temporary.