I took a four-day trip to Palm Springs, CA, and Joshua Tree National Park with Katherine and Jonathan in early January. Above, Katherine and I take a selfie at San Jancinto State Park, a really cool place accessed by a rotating arial tramway. At the top of straight-up rocky mountains, there is an unexpected magical place of forests, streams, overlooks, trails, and snow.
After that, we explored Joshua Tree National Park, which had very different terrain.
It's a desert: dry, rocky, cold, windy, and other-worldly.
Photos below.
The Mormons gave the Joshua Tree its name.
They thought the trees looked like the Old Testament prophet Joshua,
his arms raised, guiding them to their new home.
They had good imaginations, ha.
The sandstone rocks were weirdly formed by eons of blowing wind.
Here we are at "Skull Rock."
Heart Rock
I eventually ditched the hat because it kept blowing off
