Desert Southwest

We had a fabulous week out west visiting Joshua Tree, Mojave Desert, Death Valley, and the Santa Monica Mountains. A description of the trip is below along with photos. Enjoy!



Day 1: We arrived in LA in late afternoon to rain (the only rain of the trip). After getting our luggage and rental car, we decided we would drive through the Beverly Hills neighborhood. After battling traffic, we drove down Rodeo Drive in the rain and saw a number of extremely expensive cars and shops. As traffic continued to worsen, we decided to get on our way to Palm Springs. Traffic in LA STINKS!

Day 2: As we arrived in Palm Springs in the dark, we awoke in our hotel room to look out the window to a beautiful view of mountains with snow dusted peaks. We got on our way to Joshua Tree entering through the Cottonwood entrance. We did a number of short hikes here as well as two 3-mile hikes with some elevation gain: Ryan Mountain and Fortynine Palms Oasis. There was some snow from the previous night, but enjoyed the fresh air which was much warmer than Chicago! This night, we stayed at the 6-room Harmony Motel which U2 stayed at when working on their Joshua Tree album...very cool.

Day 3: We headed towards Mojave National Preserve. There are not a lot of established hikes here, so we stuck to the recommended Rings Loop Trail and Teutonia Peak...both were terrific. The rings trail was a little difficult for me...I needed Rob's help to get up one of the inclines (they needed one more ring!). The Teutonia Peak trail gave terrific views of the surrounding desert and mountains. We then headed off to Las Vegas where we had a terrific room just off the strip; we managed to see the Bellagio fountains and gamble for a couple hours (were even most of the night, but ended up slightly on the down).

Day 4: We headed toward the Death Valley Shoshone entrance...quite a view coming into the park! We stopped at all of the main attractions and did a number of smaller hikes. The largest hike on this day was the four mile Gower Gulch Loop which was good. We stayed the night in the park at Stovepipe Wells.

Day 5: We headed towards the Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes first in attempts to see animal tracks from the night before...we didn't spend a whole lot of time here, but it was very beautiful. We then drove up to Scotty's Castle for the ranch tour; it would have be nice to do the underground, but we just didn't have the time. After the tour, we headed back towards Panamint Springs doing a number of shorter hikes along the way. Death Valley is extremely large and it takes a lot of driving; there are not a lot of established trails due to the harsh conditions for most of the year. Should we have spent another day there, we would have wanted a high clearance 4x4 vehicle. We both decided we liked the hiking at other parks we have visited more, but regardless, the trip into Death Valley was well worth it.

Day 6: We awoke about 30 miles from the Santa Monica Mountains (but in LA, 30 miles does not mean 30 minutes!). After a very long and winding road, we made it to the Sandstone Peak trailhead. We did the six mile Standstone Peak-Mishe Mokwa trail loop and it was certainly one of our favorites of the trip; a hike with many views and interesting landscapes. After the hike, we make it down to the Pacific Ocean and drove Highway 1 through the Malibu/Santa Monica areas. We stopped at Solstice Canyon and did the Canyon-Rising Sun Trail loop; I was expecting easy after reading the Canyon Trail description, but instead, I should have been reading the "Rising Sun" description to know that we would be hiking up to the top of the canyon! It paid off with beautiful views. Another favorite was a short walk to Point Dume State Reserve passing by some lovely homes on the coast and admiring their blooming landscapes. We then made it back to LAX, checked into our hotel, and left early the next morning.

Another great trip; the perfect loop through southern California (well, except for that LA traffic)!