“Yeah, Desert Sky - Dream beneath the Desert Sky”
A drive through Joshua Tree National Park might take a couple hours, viewing the park from the road. An exploration of the park would take a lifetime. Joshua Tree National Park has over 550,000 acres of wilderness filled with a variety of plants and animals that make their home in this land shaped by strong winds, unpredictable torrents of rain, and climatic extremes. Every now and then, man intrudes in this wilderness and leaves his brief, passing mark among the surreal geologic features that cover the landscape. Let’s go see what we can find.
It seemed like a good idea at the time. Park the truck along a turnout on the Geology Tour Road, leaving the relative safety of being on a maintained and a somewhat regularly traveled dirt road, and set off on foot across the desert to a somewhat formidable looking pile of rocks collectively known as The Towers of Uncertainty. Afterall, the name alone demanded a visit.
Read MoreI remember visiting this area when I was a kid and how excited I was to get out of the car, climb the hills and explore the tunnels and drifts that dot the Hexie Mountains. And now, many years later, it’s still the same. Even though I know hundreds of people have explored these old mines, places like this seem to renew that sense of adventure and discovery I’ve had since I was a boy. And that motivates me to hike the trails, climb the mountains and explore the backcountries. The gold I find are the pictures I take.
Read MoreThe only thing I knew about the Boy Scout Trail before today was that that the one-way distance was roughly 8 miles. And while it was on my list of undone things that I wanted to do in the park, in all honesty it was towards the bottom. But my brother somehow talked me into meeting him at the trail end near Indian Cove campground, leaving one car there and taking the other car to the trailhead inside the park (he didn't have to try too hard, I really don't need much of an excuse to head out to J Tree for a hike) . That way we could hike the trail the easier (yes, I admit it) direction, downhill. And when we finished, drive back to pick up the other car.
Read MoreIt doesn't take long for me to start seeing things in the rocks when I'm hiking at J Tree. Giant mushrooms, faces, animals....they all seem to morph out of rock formations in my imagination. But one of the coolest sights I came across during the day wasn't an animal or face rock, it was a small arch rock, located on the side of a little rockhill. I've decided to adopt it and make it my own; I have named it "E's Arch." It is my pleasure to present it to you now.
Read MoreI recently found an old, 1975 edition of the Geology and Man Motor Nature Trail Guide on my bookshelf. I must have bought it back it back in the day, probably on a trip to the Monument with my brother and parents. I can remember traveling along the bumpy road, stopping at the points indicated while someone read the description of what we were looking at. Those were fun trips and as I haven’t done that since, I thought it was time to revisit the Geology Tour Road to see what I could find.
Read MoreJoshua Tree National Park, the California Gold Country, forgotten places in the Mojave Desert. These are a few of my favorite things.
