Mohave Desert March 22,2011

 

We left Quartzite and went to Desert Hot Springs for a couple days.  Quartzsite is in the Sonoran desert, Joshua Tree is in the transition between the Colorado desert and the Mohave desert. Salton sea is in the Colorado desert. We stayed in a 55+ RV resort. It had 5 hot spring pools, a club house, gym, bistro, golf course, classes, functions. Huge, beautiful place. You could buy manufactured homes or just an RV lot. We could have saved 50% on the cost of the stay by taking a 2 and half hour tour, but we missed the tours, which was probably ok, that is too long. I thought the place was beautiful, luxurious, John didn’t like it because the people were older. Not that we are looking anyway, we just wanted to sit in the hot springs. We visited Joshua tree National park, Thousand Palms oasis and Salton sea. We left today to go to Mohave Preserve, camp there and tour some caverns. We drove on route 66. Missed a turn, went to the 29 palms marine base, got to Mohave and they are not giving cavern tours now, so we went down the road and found a boondock camp (free camp) on some  BLM land. It is beautiful, in the middle of no where. We can still hear the marines shooting and blowing things up , which is kind of interesting. We also have good internet and cell service-in the  middle of no where. We are going to see the sand dunes and Joshua trees in Mohave preserve and then go back to Shoshone and go on the annual Death Valley trip with my sister Judy, her husband Laurie and his friend Neils.

Desert Hot Springs resort, pool and John in one of the 4 hot springs.

Huge windmill farm in Palm Desert, Joshua tree forest and a couple other Joshua trees. In the last photo if you look in the left corner you can see a picnic table. These trees are 30 and 40 feet high

Joshua tree is know for its excellent rock climbing. John under a Joshua tree

to the right are the climbing routes, if you look close you can see climbers. Not sure which one is banana crack, but I thing the guy on the left found the buttress. . . you can see them on the top of the right photo.

Sue with a Joshua tree and some photos of the trees and the cool rocks

Sue trying to be a Joshua tree, It was so windy and cold we were glad we had our gortex and fleece in the car, John elbowing his way thru the rocks and the car with the trees

above jumbo rocks, skull rock , some rocks on skull rock trail, below is a pencil cholla and a Mohave yucca , more skull rocks trail and John with skull rock.

spider web and cotton tail rabbit at the Oasis of Mara

thousand palms oasis in Coachella Preserve. Fan palms are the native to  California , the palm leaves are about 4 feet across. All the springs run in a line along the San Andres fault. the rest of the photos are of John in wild flowers and hiking to the top of the San Andres fault, you can see the stairs up in the 2nd to last photo.

the Salton Sea, beach, and beach with pelicans and the last one is dead fish on the shore. They had a cold snap and it killed a lot of the tilapia, which are warm water fish, the lake is usually between 70 and 90 degrees.

flowers on the Mohave desert

the bus, the desert and Erigonium, more Mohave desert, a smoke tree and sunset. The last one is a grave or a memorial in the middle of no where in the middle of the desert.