The family that we went camping with in Yosemite last year invited us to go to Joshua Tree National Park with them and several others for spring break. Joshua Trees are the largest species of the yucca genus (evergreens with sword shaped, tough leaves and white flowers). In addition to a large collection of Joshua Trees, the park is also famous for giant piles of rocks dotting the desert landscape, and people come from all over to climb these rocks. The park is also popular for stargazing. It has many hiking trails, too. Christi adores Joshua Tree. Eric and Keith had never been.

On Tuesday, the weather was clear and sunny. The three-hour drive northeast from San Diego to the high desert was beautiful. Southern California has had an unusually wet and cold winter, so the landscape was greener than normal and full of flowers, with snow capped mountains in the distance.

The campsite was located in Indian Cove, a small alcove on the outskirts of the park, conveniently located right off the main highway. While the temperatures were balmy during the day, it was cold at night. We’d decided it would be too cold for tent camping, and renting an RV was more expensive than renting a cabin/house. What was great about Indian Cove was that it was next to a residential area, so we were able to find a place that was only a 5-minute drive. With many national parks, such as Yosemite, it can be quite a long drive between the park and the closest amenities outside the park.

We arrived at the campsite at around 1400 (2:00 pm). Here’s a photo taken from atop one of the surrounding rock formations.

The boys spent the afternoon climbing rocks and playing a game called “Joe’s Gas Station.” Christi and Eric did a little bit of rock climbing, too.

At sunset, the cold set in and we headed to our rental for the night.

On Wednesday morning, we drove to the 49-Palms Oasis hike, which was another small alcove on the outskirts of the park.

The guide said that the hike was a 360-foot vertical climb. The views were scenic. When we got to the top of the peak, we realized we had to climb down to the bottom of the backside to get to the oasis. The males continued on, but the moms turned around. View from near the top:

The oasis had water in it, palm trees and — most importantly — shade. All in all, the men hiked 3.22 miles. Since they had to climb back up to the peak from the oasis, they did a total of 720-feet of climbing. Keith and Eric thought the oasis was impressive enough to be worth the hike.

The three of us had lunch back at our rental, then joined the group at the campground. We attempted to do the Indian Cove Trail, a half-mile loop near the campground. Unfortunately, the trail wasn’t well marked and we mostly wandered around in circles trying to find the trail.

We did climb a couple of the rock formations along the way.

In the early evening, the breeze picked up. We went back to rental before sunset since the breeze had made it chilly.

Sunrise Thursday:

The rest of the group left first thing Thursday the morning, so the three of us were on our own. We went into the main part of the park, using the east entrance in the town of 29-Palms. We made a brief stop in the Visitor’s Center on the way in, which had a small museum that focused primarily on the numerous Native American tribes in area.

There was only a few cars in line ahead of us to enter the park. We did the 25-mile scenic drive through the park to the west entrance, which was in the town of Joshua Tree. These photos gives a good sense of what the scenery looked like for the majority of the drive:

Along the way, we stopped at a rock formation called Skull Rock, so named because one of the rocks looks like a Picasso-esque skull.

We did some climbing. Many of the other rocks also had small caves that resembled orifices.

As we exited the park, we noticed that the line of cars waiting to enter stretched for a solid mile. We were glad we’d chosen to enter on the east side!

We headed home, feeling fortunate about our timing. There had been a big storm a few days before our trip, and today the wind was picking up and the skies were becoming increasingly overcast. We were glad to be leaving before the weather turned bad.

Greg and Kim, thank you for letting us post your photos!