March 5, 2017 Joshua Tree National Park, California

Sunny day in the 60’s with high winds. We drove up to the north end of the park. It’s highest point is 5,000 plus feet high.

I was photographing the sign when a helpful man asked me if I wanted to be in my photo and he took my picture. We came next to the Ocotillo Patch. The ocotillos only grow in this tiny area. We passed Fried Liver Wash, a phacelia and teddy bear cholla with buds or fruits on them. Next we came to the Cholla Gardens. To our horror it had a trail through the dense cholla patch. These are the vicious cactus that attacked me twice in Organ Pipe. The segments seem to jump off the cactus and the spines have barbs in the end. They are very painful and almost impossible to remove. They didn’t even have fences to keep the cholla back. There were lots of warning signs.

Fortunatly we were armed with our combs- that is the easiest way to get them off. John had his stuck in his hair under his hat. I used mine to ward off the evil chollas. The teddy bear cholla only grow in this one area of the park.

After that we hiked the Arch Rock nature trail. These rocks are eroded fractured monzogranitic extrusions.   Another helpful couple insisted on taking both our photos in the arch.

Some more cool rocks (monzogranite) on the Arch Rock trail.

Some more cool rocks (monzogranite) on the Arch Rock trail.

John sitting in a small cave.  Another cave, black flowers. Not sure what this holey thing is, I think part of a dead agave and another rock formation.

From this point you are supposed to see the face drawn to the right in the rocks. We did not see it. But we did see Skull rock farther down the road. 

More fractured rocks. The joshua trees only grow in the higher elevations of the park. They are huge, 15-30 feet tall. Here is a joshua tree forest. 

A couple more shots of the joshua trees. The tall pointed rock in the photo is about 100 feet tall and there was a man standing on top. There is a rope dropped down the right side of it. No idea how you would climb up this thing.

 The curly things are actually a plant, pencil cholla- the stems are the size of pencils and the Hall of Horrors is not the Cholla garden, but an area for rock climbing. The valley below the park, where we are camped.