Welcome to Palm Springs and Joshua Tree NP

Feb 19, 2024

It was time for a little get away from Grand Rapids, so we grabbed a cheap flight to Palm Springs, CA, arriving Sundaynight at 10 pm It seems that the rental agency always offers a wide variety of cars, and then none of the ones we choose are available upon arrival. Would you like the Dodge Challenger muscle are or the giant pickup truck? No we’ll take the electric car, the Chevy Bolt. Then we needed to learn how to drive and charge it. Thank fully we had get acclimated day today which allowed time for learning.

Today we arose early to a surprisingly good breakfast at the Homewood Suites by the airport, made exceedingly affordable by Alice’s Hilton employee status. Soon we were packed and off to the Art Museum and the Museum trail. Driving through downtown Palm Springs one is immediately impressed with both the flatness of the city and the abrupt and steep transition to mountains. Walking through the flat parking lot of the museum to the rear corner, the mountain starts in earnest with a 30 degree rise.

The trail was steep, rocky and well marked. We made a strange turn the seemed to be the wrong way, but later seemed to be a planned loop. In any case, we found the direct upward trails again.

The morning was cool and there were only a few hikers. From having read the blogs, we knew that an early start was necessary to avoid crowds. We climbed further and soon came to a rest spot with picnic benches. We chatted with ladies from Alberta, Canada.

Pressing further up the mountain we came to a pull up bar on top of a rise. We wondered who decided to take this thing apart an lug it all the way up here to be able to do pull-ups on top of the mountain?

Robert gave us the idea of continuing upwards and then taking a connecting trail down rather than just following the same trail down. So we found the Skyline trail and the Lytel trail with a small false turn. A young Indian woman from Ohio walked with us for a while and , together, we found the Skyline trail.

Soon after getting on skyline trail we started to head down and also began to run into more hikers. Kippu was one of the hikers, who we chatted with for quite a while as we headed down the mountain. He was from Flint, MI and now spends time in San Francisco, Saugatuck, and Palm Springs. We had a good talk about his field of urban planning as well as the early days of the AIDS epidemic. I related my experiences taking care of AIDs patient in the early days where there was no good treatment.

After getting down, Alice and I got back to where our car was, and decided it was time to try out charging our electric vehicle. The cars were parked in a way that it was impossible to get close enough to the charger without parking illegally. We decided to pull into the illegal spot and take our chances, but stay in the car. The fast charge mode worked pefectly and no one bothered us. I was glad to have this skill under my belt so that we could head out into the hinterlands fully charged.

We decided to walk around the downtown a little since we were right there We were lucky to snag a parking place at L’atelier cafe. What a lovely place, with French decor and it felt like a little French cafe with strong coffee, croissants, quiche and pastries. I had a salmon and spinach quiche and Alice had a salmon Benedict croissant, and later we enjoyed a strawberry tart. This was definitely the haut cuisine of the day in a very hoity-toity area of town.

We headed back to the hotel, and then we found the low rent shopping area, still within an attractive set of strip malls. We visited Aldi and Marshall’s The clientele suddenly shifted to the hard working Hispanics and white families to work the stores, the construction and all of the other lower income tasks needed in a city We dropped off our purchases and some food for a light dinner out hotel. We decided to go to a little strip mall with Hispanic businesses we had spotted on the way in. Sure enough there were Japanese, Guatemalan, Saldvadoran restaurants, so we stopped into the Salvadoran restaurant.

There we had simple, inexpensive but very fresh meal of pupusas and ceviche. We learned about the owner’s immigration story, his marriage and their talented daughter who was able to go to Berkley school of music in Boston and is now underemployed in Hollywood.

After eating we took a nap and then headed out in the early evening to get a short hike in before sunset, which is at 5:30 pm here.

It seems we have a little jet lag. It’s only 7:30 pm but I’m feeling sleepy but will try to stay up til 8 to climb into bed. Tomorrow we have an exciting canyon hike planned, so we’ll try to be well rested.