Joshua Tree National Park

Jill's Journal: If you grew up in the 80s, “The Joshua Tree” means superband U2’s best-selling rock album. As the band drove around for three days in 1986 in the Mojave Desert looking for ideal locations to photograph for the album’s cover, they came across Joshua trees and were smitten by the unusual tree and the legend of how it got its name (Mormon immigrants christened it after the Biblical Joshua. The tree’s outstretched limbs reminded them of Joshua with his arms outstretched in prayer, guiding the Israelites to the promised land.). U2’s Bono was so taken by the tree he quickly declared the album must be named “The Joshua Tree.” The rest, as they say, is history.

Bono wasn’t the only one intrigued by Joshua trees, which are found primarily in the Mojave Desert. In fact there’s believed to be about 1.5 million Joshua trees in the world; around 1.4 million of those are in the Mojave. The remaining few are spread out in the surrounding states – Nevada, Arizona, and even Utah. The area of today’s Joshua Tree National Park, which is just bigger than the state of Rhode Island, has been a U.S. National Monument since 1936 and was made into a national park as recently as 1994.

We spent one day in Joshua Tree going on a few small (one to three mile) but beautiful hikes. Unfortunately, we were a week or two too late to see a few of the ranger guided-only attractions. They had already closed down tours for the summer (summer comes early in the desert!), but we still got a pretty good taste for the park and would love to make it back someday. If you like the desert, this is a wonderful national park. There’s lots of variety and stark beauty. The girls saw a ton of lizards, got to climb plenty of large rocks, and only sustained one scraped knee between the three of them, so they deemed it pretty outstanding as well.

Juniper berries are prevalent on the Barker Dam trail.

The leaves (spines?) on a Joshua tree's trunk are like daggers. Gently touch the end of one and I guarantee it will hurt. Brush your bare arm against one accidentally and you will involuntarily leap away with a yelp of pain.

Joshua Tree is particularly popular with rock climbers. We spotted even more rock climbers than we did lizards.

Rob had found a downloadable e-book about a Joshua tree named Lily. The girls spent one of our hikes hunting down the perfect “Lily.” This one was it!

Native Americans left behind petroglyphs (carved images in the rock) and pictographs (painted images on the rock) from the time they spent here. These could be hundreds to thousands of years old.

This is one of the vistas from Keys View. That mountain peak in the distance over to the right of the photo is Mt. San Jacinto, where the Palm Springs Tram took us last week.

Joshua trees don’t bloom often (not even every year), so it’s a treat to find one in full bloom.

Skull Rock, so named for obvious reasons. :)

Our final stop of the day was the Cholla Cactus Garden. It’s a large area filled with jumping cholla. We warned the girls not to get too close…these suckers attach themselves to unsuspecting visitors and it’s said to be painful. Happily, we walked away unscathed, taking away only a healthy respect for these plants.

Visiting wonderful Joshua Tree National Park was our last big “hurrah” in Southern California. It’s been such a fantastic few months. I've loved revisiting the SoCal of my childhood and being able to share it with our girls. Rob vacationed in SoCal as a kid and then went to college in the L.A.-area, so he's felt the same way. And, while it's all been new to the girls, much of it has been new to us as well. When you live in a place, you often don't see as many of "the sights" as when you're a tourist. We've loved being tourists!