The mere mention of California conjures up images of either Hollywood, Los Angeles, San Diego and their sun-drenched beaches, or the cold and clinical image of the San Francisco Bay Area tech companies. But the largest chunk of California - a 400-mile-long stretch of Central Valley - supplies a quarter of the food America eats. It's an incredibly fertile strip of land nestled between the coastal ranges and the Sierra Nevada. This is the vast California that takes 5-6 hours to drive from the Bay Area to Los Angeles. This is the California that urbanites simply ignore when making their 3 day trip to the National Parks of the Sierra Nevada.

The San Francisco Bay Area's rising housing costs have been showing their impact on the laid back Central Valley communities. As more tech workers move out of the Bay Area further out into Tracy and Gilroy, communities from Tracy, South Sacramento and Gilroy are moving into the farmland of Central California, to towns such as Modesto and Los Banos. Driving through Los Banos, one can see the flurry of new development, and cannot help but wonder - where (and when) will this stop, if ever.

Countless times have we driven through the garlic-heavy air of Gilroy, past the San Louis Reservoir towards either Los Angeles or the National Parks. On all these occassions I have always been fascinated by the lush green hills of Santa Nella which turn a fluorescent yellow in the summer. On this last trip to Kings Canyon, we finally took a breather and snapped some images of the Golden State's golden hillsides.

Since I was visiting Kings Canyon in late summer - perhaps the absolute worst time to visit this park, I decided to drive through the small towns and settlements of the central valley between Los Banos and Fresno. While going to Fresno, we took CA-33 South via Firebaugh, and 180 East through Kerman to reach Fresno. Coming back, we darted north via CA-145, and then west through Avenue 7, traversing the fertile Valley on ruler straight backcountry roads. Couldn't help but hum the tunes to many a Creedence Clearwater Revival song throughout the trip.