Wasco Rose Fields with Kanaka
Saturday morning my friend Kanaka from Los Angeles texted casually to ask if I was free to drive to LA. I was going to be free the whole weekend. There were no engagements whatsoever. I suggested she come over and we could go for a drive someplace nearby. She liked the idea. Within a couple of hours she arrived in Bakersfield from Thousand Oaks.
We had a rather exotic lunch at home before we took off on the drive. Had made a curried vegetable from the blossom of banana that my colleague/ friend had given from her garden. This was the first ever time I made it at home. Added black eyed peas to it. It was quite tasty. Though a messy process to eliminate the sticky sap by soaking in water overnight. The blossom had to be chopped using gloves to prevent the sap from messing the hands. Besides this dish I made bharit out of baked butternut squash from another colleague’s garden. And then there was kharwas for dessert.
Around 2 pm we set out on a drive to the nearby town of Wasco. Besides the staple produce of almonds and pistachios this town is famous for its roses. Over 55% of the roses in the USA are grown in Wasco. Every September there is a Rose Festival held in town, the weekend after Labor Day. I have fond memories of the festival from the time when the kids were small.
We arrived in the town after a few stops to take pictures with a halted freight train on the tracks that ran parallel to the road and pistachio laden trees. We passed many almond and pistachio groves but roses were nowhere to be seen. Being just two women we had no problem stopping to ask for directions 😄. A local store owner happily directed us to the route that had the roses.
Sure enough within less than 2 miles from the Main Street where we had stopped the colorful fields were in sight. We stopped at the first field we arrived at. The flower beds were all soaked in water. We took a few pictures and decided to drive further. A few hundred feet down the road bigger rose fields began to emerge. Here the soil was dry and we could actually stand amidst the bushes for pictures. The expanse of these colorful flowers in hues of white, pink, red, orange, yellow reminded me of the tulip farms in the Netherlands I had seen earlier in April this year. The beautiful roses were growing in abundance barely 15-20 miles from my home. We drove around the entire area and got back onto the freeway once we had our heart full.
A hot cup of coffees upon reaching home and Kanaka was on her way again to her home. It had been a very lovely day with a dear friend from my residency days. We had caught up with each other’s lives and everything else under the sun. Saturday couldn’t have been better.
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