Yuma - not much to say

Yuma. I must say that Yuma did nothing for me. We stayed at a very friendly SKP park and the highlight was the swimming pool. We also got to see the Yuma Territorial Prison State Park sitting above the Colorado River just days before the State of Arizona closed the park due to budget problems. And that’s about all I have to say about Yuma.

Sunny Days in Quartzsite

Quartzsite, Arizona. What a great spot. Most of the year Quartzsite has a very low population. The faces of the old-timers are road maps of wrinkles. These friendly people welcome any and all visitors with open arms. In January and February the population in this tiny decrepit and quaint little town swells into the tens of thousands as the snowbirds descend upon the area for the free camping that goes along with several big shows like the gem and mineral show, the car show, the RV show and many more.

We thoroughly enjoyed our time in Quartzsite, camped out in the desert with nothing around but the early spring wildflowers and beautiful sunsets. Our days were filled with a gentle warm sunshine, game playing, squirt gun fights and were topped off by a weekend visit from Grandma and Grandpa.

Flint flys away

Flint took off for Washington. Us Girlies were left all on our own so we hung out with Grandma and Grandpa a little longer, visited the Living Desert and headed off on our adventure toward Arizona. We spent our first night on the road sitting in a beautiful spot along the Colorado River. Cami and Andi got to fish for the first time. After casting her line in, Cami asked why the fish were not biting. I gently informed her she would need to be patient. After 30 minutes of fishing (enforced by Mom), the girls gave up. No fish were caught. Cami then decided to let me know that the fish were supposed to want to be caught just like in the Brian Jacques books she reads. She had planned on having fish for dinner, cleaned and cooked by Mom of course. Luckily no fish!

After fishing we learned that other people (the homeless, pit bull breeding variety) were also sharing our beautiful spot. After a restless night we headed to Quartzsite, Arizona for a little peace and quiet.

Mojave National Preserve Part 4 (of 4)

After the adventures in the lava tube and such described in our last post, we enjoyed a wonderful sunset as you can see in the picture. It was so beautiful how the setting sun reflected off of the dunes and the incoming clouds. On our last full day in Mojave we decided to go to the far east side of the park and visit Hole in the Wall. We had to leave the park to the south, drive 30 miles or so east and re-enter the park and go 20 miles north. Like I have said before, some of these parks are big. We were able to listen to a very knowledgeable and obviously passionate geologist give a talk about how the entire area was formed via volcanic action and plate tectonics over geological time. The area we were in was formed by a lava eruption quite a few millenia ago. The lava contained superheated water/steam under immense pressure and when the lava pool exploded from its containment underground the water flashed away and left a very porous pumice like rock that literally splattered everywhere you see. As it eroded it exposed more and more of the holes that the steam left when it escaped. So, they named the monolithic rock area Hole in the Wall. There is a trail around the monolith called the rings trail. Now on this day it was cold. It was threatening snow and was cloudy and windy, so we did a lot less photographing and a lot more just moving and shaking. The Park Service has installed metal rings in some of the taller rock chutes and walls to facilitate climbing, hence the name the Rings trail. That evening we started our packing up since the wind was kicking up (a lot, we actually considered moving the trailer to face the wind better to ameliorate the buffeting and rocking the wind was giving) and we were to pull up our stakes and head to the North side of Joshua Tree National Park the next day. The day as we departed this magical place of dunes and desert we drove into a snowstorm! Go figure, of course it is high mountain desert, but still, it was quite the experience. Unfortunately by the time we could pull over and retrieve the camera from the trailer we had passed the worst of it, but there was still residual snow on the cactus (notice the cactus flowers alongside the snow on the cactus). The wind was still going fairly strong (tail wind fortunately)and it was blowing ground level clouds across the landscape. The rocky foothills shown in the picture would be occluded completely one minute and exposed the next over the course of the fifteen minutes we were there watching. All in all a magical finish to this mesmerizing location (to date our favorite place). From here were moving south to the North part of the Joshua Tree National Park.

Mojave National Preserve Part 3

After exploring the dunes, we decided to go see some of the rest of the highlights of the park. So, we traveled through the Kelso Depot area and went up to the Joshua Tree Forest in the NE part of the park. It turns out that the largest stand of Joshua Trees in North America is actually in Mojave National Preserve. Maybe the name was already taken by the actual Joshua Tree National Park south of here. But,as the picture shows, not only was the number of Joshua Trees large, but the plants themselves were quite large. There were also many amazing rocks to climb and explore. Most of them were large (huge) granite monolithic boulders barely emerging from the ground. Some were almost a hundred feet long though most were not over ten feet tall. There were also a few outcroppings that allowed for some fantastic vistas off in the distance. After a leisurely stroll through the Joshua Trees we drove back around through the Kelso Depot and to a euphemistically designated 'unimproved' road. Forty five minutes and 4 miles later, we emerged, kidneys fairly tenderized by the washboard road into a basalt landscape of hills and valleys that was with the exception of the types of plants, much like some of the Hawaii lava fields Diana said. Nevertheless, there was vibrant life among the desolation with a variety of creosote, cactus and some small shrubs. Our destination at the end of the shock rattling road was an intact lava tube that visitors could climb into. Though the Park does not actively maintain the tube, it had recently upgraded the ladder entry instead of a rickety wooden ladder. The tube was not very long, 75-100', but it was fairly tall with the exception of one tight spot. There were one small and one larger openings in the ceiling that let light in from above. Since we were alone in the tube and given the road conditions did not expect anyone to show up in the immediate future, we (that would be me, Flint) decided to toss some of the very fine dry dust on the floor up into the air so that the light beams would be highlighted. From the picture it is readily apparent. It was a sort of Indian Jones moment, though we did not find any traps or golden idols. Bummer. So, after some more lava exploring, we re-traversed the washboard alleyway back to our dune side camp. The next post will detail our adventures in Hole in the Wall on the far East side of the park an hour or so away from camp.

Mojave Desert National Preserve II

And Thusly the Mojave adventure continues. We spent the next day and a half exploring the dunes in detail. With the weird weather, lots of rain previously and the (apparently) ever present wind, there were very few people on the dunes. In fact, during both climbs of the dunes, we only saw two other people close by, and that only on the main (tallest) dune by the designated parking lot. There was evidence of a couple of people that must have come before we arrived, but for all intents and purposes, it was our own private playground. Distances are deceptive, and looking at the dunes, it is hard to tell how high they are or how far it is to get to the top. In one of the pictures looking down into the valley, we are at the top of one of the tallest dunes, shown from the bottom in one picture. If you look closely at the center of the valley picture, there is a small black/green dot. That is the stand of trees next to our trailer (remember in my last post the picture of the trees and the trailer I said to use as reference?), so we are a ways away. Of course one of the joys of climbing the dunes is running down them and scuffing sand off the ridges. These dunes are ‘singing’ or ‘booming’ dunes. So, when we scuffed enough sand with enough force off of the windward side, they made a cool humming, droning noise. The wind was a gentle breeze, which was refreshing since it started out as a clear day with the sun a beating down. Later in the day, the wind really picked up and in one picture you can see the sand blowing over the edges of the dunes. Interesting fact though; even though the sand was blowing, by definition, sand does not rise above about one meter in the wind, anything above that is dust, which for the most part has long blown away. So even in the wind, very little debris got in our eyes (except Andi since she was the shortest, and even that debris was more from rolling down the dune sides methinks.). Then, after cannon-balling down the dunes, we ended back at the trailer for some rest and well deserved showers (sandy beds are not so much fun). With my Eagles Nest (camping hammock thingy, look it up online) set up in the trees and some chairs set up in the leeward shade of the trailer, lots of relaxation was had by all. During the afternoon, clouds rolled in and provided a beautiful back drop against the dunes to reflect the setting sun. It could have been the isolation, it could have been just what we needed right then, it could have been anything, but I can say, no matter what the reason, the dunes at Mojave were one of if not –the- most magical place we have been to yet. The next post will detail our adventures in the Joshua Trees and the Lava Fields (complete with Indiana Jones style Lava Tube). Stay tuned….

Mojave National Preserve, part one

Wow, Mojave Desert National Preserve (Preserves are just like parks, except you can hunt on them) is probably, to date my favorite place and just about everyone in the family agrees. As the title suggests, there will be more than one post about this area. The variety of stunning vistas and scenery combined with a picture limit of 5 pictures per blog post, well, you do the math. After spending the evening between Death Valley, Parumph and arriving in Mojave at Tekopa, CA and availing ourselves to a wonderful triple sitting in the mineral hot pools, we arrived in Mojave early in the day. Once you are in the park midway, you are greeted by the sight of the dunes off in the distance. The dunes (our favorite part of this (so far) favorite park), cover about 45 square miles and are the remnants of an old lake bed from over fifty miles away. They are the largest by volume size in N. America, though at 'only' 600 plus feet high, they are not the highest in America. We stopped at Kelso Depot on our way to the dunes and availed ourselves of a little frontier style child care. I am thinking about having something similar welded to the back of the trailer for when the kids get too rowdy or start arguing (again). One of the nice things about Mojave is that you can park in designated areas for free. We were very fortunate to find a spot by a stand of Tamarisk trees (hard to kill non-native intruder species that take over any chance they can, but they sure were pretty and fast growing when they were planted oh so long ago with no concept of intruder species and local ecology diversity structure, but I digress). Included is a picture of the trailer more for a sense of scale for some of the pictures in later posts. Of course, what do kids do around nice sand? Well bury themselves of course! The sand was pretty nice and for the most part, rather fine and smooth, like beach sand, less the beach. Even in the desert and in miles of sand no less, there is an abundance of life. Many species of plants and some animals have evolved and adapted to the localized climate and conditions to the point they do not exist anywhere else in the park (or elsewhere for that matter). One of them is the Fringe Toe Lizard, whose namesake toes allow them to get up and scoot across the In another post I will have a picture of another lizard, in another part of the Mojave desert and it looks completely different relative to coloration. Well, all this was just the first day of a week in Mojave, so the next post will cover the dunes themselves (maybe 2 posts, we shall see)