Robert Wood and his wife Tula moved from Texas to California in 1941. Initially, he settled in the historic art colony of Carmel and seems to have remained there until 1946, when he moved south to Laguna Beach, another art colony. Carmel was ideal for an artist, as the rugged coastline of Big Sur, as well as Pt. Lobos - just south of Carmel - and the famous 17-mile drive through the Del Monte Forest provided dramatic landscape subjects. During World War II (1941-1945) Wood painted dozens of views of Pt. Lobos and Carmel, though he also ventured Eastward on sketching trips to the Colorado Rockies. The Carmel works are delicately handled, in vivid contrast to the much more rugged Carmel scenes of Paul Dougherty (1877-1947) and William Ritschel (1864-1949), two National Academicians who were still active in Carmel when Wood lived there.

During his Carmel years Wood remained faithful to his soft, detailed style of the 1930s, which shows an awareness of Impressionism but is still faithful to his English roots.