The colorful coastal kite season is fluttering on the stiff breezes of spring

ETHEREAL APRIL, with its pastel hues and soft edges, doesn't instantly strike one as a month possessing a dramatic excess of saturated splendor. Of course, that initial impression isn't true at all, as any April aficionado will passionately attest. Simply look to the wildflowers that spectacularly sprout over so many of the Golden State's remoter hillsides, not to mention the orange-as-the-sun citrus fruits that fill the gorgeous groves of Ojai and other verdant valleys. The natural world is in a beautiful burst as the fourth month blows in on a fragrant, ever-warming breeze, it's true, but there are other colorful sights to admire, even if they don't hail from the wilder side of life. Take the kite festivals that begin dotting a few of our coastal towns. Nope, nylon triangles don't germinate in the forest like flowers nor grow on trees like fruit, but we can admire how they ride an April breeze so fetchingly.

SANTA BARBARA AND MORRO BAY... will send these fetching flyers into the sky, by the dozens, in the days ahead, and both events are free to join. Flying your own fluttery work of art? You can, or you can stop by to watch the weightless wonders as they flap and twirl high above the heads of onlookers. "Love is a breeze" is the heartwarming theme of the 2024 Santa Barbara Kite Festival, and the place? You'll want to soar for the Great Meadow at Santa Barbara City College (head for the west campus lawn) on April 14. Just two weeks later, and a bit up the coast, is another kite-tastic stalwart: the Morro Bay Kite Festival. Kite-flying pros have praised the airy event for having "some of the best kite flying wind in the world," so stop by and put these famous currents to the test.