We all need to get outside every once in a while—and that includes music legend John Mayer. So he travels to Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park, gets in his favorite vehicle, and wanders freely with a film crew in tow.

Driving through the ancient trees and along the golden coastlines of Northern California, Mayer goes searching for…well, he doesn’t know what he’s searching for exactly. But like many people who venture into the great outdoors, he ends up discovering far more than he could have imagined.

In this video, Mayer takes a meandering journey into nature, stopping along the way to chat with a fisherman, skip a few rocks, and contemplate the meaning of the outdoors—and life itself—with a local park guide. As the video closes, Mayer strums his guitar and sings an ode to the open road and to traveling simply.

John Mayer is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist, and record producer.

John Mayer wrote “A Simple Song” on his birthday in 2014. He’d performed it live on a handful of occasions but had never recorded it. The song rejects the ostentatious “private flights to paradise” and instead celebrates instead the joys of traveling unpretentiously.

Sung on a golden Northern California beach at the end of a journey through some of the country’s most beautiful wild places, the song takes on a special meaning. The track was not written with this particular trip in mind, but it perfectly captures its themes.

Mayer chose the song for this video himself—a testament to the project’s personal resonance for the musician.