March 4, 2017 Joshua Tree National Park, California

The old software for writing my blog is not working, so I am  using the blogger software that comes with the blog. It is horrible with photo placement. But what the heck, better than no blog.

70’s and mostly cloudy.

The bus parked in the BLM free dispersed camping right outside of Joshua tree. The flowers were spectacular. Poppies, evening primrose, chia, and lupine.

Bladder pod- a bush, pink flowers and lupines. Same flowers, different view. Huge fields of  a mix of varieties and colors.

 Closer up of  the flowers. Evening primrose, some kind of little mound plant, crypanthia and chia.

Poppies and lupines. Another lush view toward the mountains. 

We walked to Cottonwood springs. It is one of the many oases is the park. You can see the parking lot behind it is packed. Lots of people here. These fan  palm trees are HUGE and untrimmed, John is in the lower right hand corner of this pic. The fan palm is the only palm tree that is native to California.

The cottonwoods in spring green behind the palms.  Desert dandilion, round trimmed looking brittle bushes almost ready to bloom, backlit fan palm leaves, and a really deep hole from the indians grinding the mesquite beans. 

Another field of flowers. More white evening primrose and less poppies. In the left shot you can see the layer of smog hanging over Palm Springs in the valley below.

A triple decker chia bloom, looking down from the top of the same bloom and some big yuccas near the spring. There is pollen all over my feet from walking in the flowers. 

 I took this of John outstanding in the field.

John took this of me smelling the flowers. A really burly looking German made  go anywhere coach.

Back at camp waiting for sunset.

Sunset was pretty brief, too many clouds.