Joshua Tree NP, Palm Springs and visitors!

 

Hello from sunny California! It only seems appropriate to start the post with a gorgeous sunset and palm trees! It was a long day of travel to get here, we even passed "the end of the world". 😎

Good thing the campground has a hot tub! My happy place at the end of a travel day or hike. Also a nice place to have visitors come. One of the main reasons to came back to California was to see my nephew Ben who got a job in Irvine earlier this year. He and his friend Tim came out to Palm Springs and we started our time together at the Tropicale restaurant. Great food & cocktails there!

Dave got this great shot of the moon that night, it is amazing what these phone cameras can do! The next day we were off to Joshua Tree National park to do some hiking.

Unfortunately no one was at the sign when we got there so we had to settle for a selfie and then reverse it so you could read the sign!

 

Lots of pretty and unique flowers along the trails.

We hiked to Ryan's ranch, or at least what's left of it and saw this little guy on the way.

 

 

Such a cool path on the Barker Dam Nature trail. Good thing we had strong Ben there to clear the way!😉

Ben & Tim rock climbing, oh to be young and that agile again! Not much water at the dam below, good thing there was a sign or we might have missed it.

 

Can't have a post about Joshua Tree National Park and then not include at least one picture of a Joshua Tree! The rock formations were really unusual here, check out the "chain of smaller rocks" in-bedded in the larger boulder. Now how did that happen??

We had such a great time having them stay with us. Tim was a real trooper staying in our RV and learning how to play Euchre and Hand, Knee & Foot!  We won't say who won but let's just say Tim had great beginner's luck...and he was my partner!!  😋 We had a nice big breakfast with eggs, bacon, sausage, biscuits and fruit to send them off.

With another day remaining for Dave & I we went and played tourist in Palm Springs. We road the aerial tram up some 8000 feet which gave some pretty incredible views of the valley below.

Traveling up that 8000 feet meant that the temperature went down about 40 degrees. Good thing the sun was still shinning and we brought our coats!

Back down in town and Dave got to enjoy hanging out with Marilyn but he was still my date for pizza and gelato!

That's it for our quick trip to California! We're off to Arizona now but we'll leave you with some videos of the tram ride. It was so cool seeing the views change as the tram not only went up and down but the floor rotated as well. Good thing it only lasted about 10 minutes each way (don't worry the video isn't that long!) Enjoy!