SPRING WILDFLOWER TRIP
March – April 2010
It is the last few days of March and the weather report called for an entire week of rain. That is a good enough reason to no longer delay escaping the cold wet winters of Sonoma County. Every spring I like to begin the year’s travels by heading for the desert seeking wildflowers and cactus blossoms. Sinbad and I left on a Monday morning at nine A.M. as the first showers began and arrived in Adelanto, CA. Four-hundred-sixty-seven miles later. I have fond memories of Adelanto. As a teenager along with my friends Larry, Gary and Cliff we would drive here from our southern California home to shoot .22’s at anything that moved. It was all barren desert back then with very few buildings if any for miles around. Ten years later I would be returning to this area for some of my first motorcycle desert races on a little Hodaka 90. Today it is built up with huge tracts of homes, mini-malls, truck stops, a civic center, motorcycle parks and more. I located an RV park, Adelanto RV. It looked more like a squatter’s encampment for the possibly homeless seeking cheap rent in their desert beaten trailer or camper. The office was closed. A woman who looked like she was living out of her car pulled up alongside as I read and re-read the self-registration instruction sign. It was the NO PIT BULLS part of the sign that caused me to pause. There had to be a story there. She was the ‘assistant manager’ meaning she worked on weekends when the owner was away. “Just fill out the envelope in the box, put in thirty dollars (the sign said thirty-three) and shove it through the slot” she said. “You can park anywhere.” The envelope was no more than a business size envelope with ‘Adelanto RV Park’ stamped on it. If I were to put it through the slot now then leave to go eat, what proof did I have that I paid when I returned? There was no receipt. I decided to pay when I returned. I never went back. I went down the road, spied a Mexican food restaurant at a truck stop and stopped there to eat dinner. The food was very good, authentic but the beer was just cool. Instead of going back to the RV park we over-nighted with the truckers, saving thirty dollars and had probably a better night’s sleep.
In the morning we pulled away, ate breakfast along the way by the side of the road and arrived at Anza Borrego State Park’s Coach Whip Canyon Wash camp just after noon. This is a favorite remote camp area I had been coming to for years. This is the beauty of Anza Borrego–it is the only State Park where you can boondock camp. Although it was only seventy-five degrees it seemed warm to me coming from chilly northern California. I set up camp, pulled out the awning, carpet, chair and table and sat back to relax. Within the hours the wind picked up from a breeze to a hearty blow fest occasionally whipping up buckets of desert sand. By evening everything inside was gritty.
We left early for the little town of Borrgeo Springs which is surrounded by State Park land. If you ever go there, buy the bags of locally grown grapefruit that are for sale at stands. Four dollars a bag (honor system–leave money in the box). You’ve never had grapefruit so good in your life. From there I backtracked a few miles out of town to nearby Clark Dry Lake, the target for aircraft strafing run practice during the Second World War. I went off for a hike hoping to find more fifty caliber shell casings while the wind continued to blow unrelentingly. By a few hundred yards short of the lake I gave up and returned back to camp. A gusty evening rocked Sinbad and I to sleep.
Come morning it was peacefully still and quiet yet overcast. By ten A.M. the skies cleared and the sun shone brightly promising to be a wonderful day. I drove back into town and walked around checking the real estate offices. I do this every time I come here. It’s a sort of a self-flagellating practice of mine for I have always had the dream of living out my life in little Borrego Springs. Prices were down for homes with one comparable to ours north of the Bay Area at half Sonoma County prices. Even a nice double-wide trailer at Roadrunner Trailer Park can be had for less than $40,000, not that I could ever live like that. Many of the businesses I remember were now gone, more causalities of the poor economy. I moved on up to the established State Park campground where I was given a senior discount of three dollars off the thirty-five dollar camp fee even though I was six months short of being the sixty-two year old age requirement. This is Easter Week and it showed with kids and their families about. I took an hour hike towards the far hills then bicycled up to my old camp from the previous year where came across a beautiful orange Coachwhip snake sunning himself in the road. I moved him over to the dirt to safety. We have to vacate the site by noon the next day but this will work fine as I planned to hike up into Palm Canyon.
The Palm Canyon hike is the most popular hike in Anza Borrego as it originates right from the campground. It is one hike I had never done probably due to its popularity. My plan was to get an early start and beat the crowd. I got a bit later of a start on the hike than I should have but fortunately no one was about and it didn’t get too hot. It is a one and a half mile hike in which took me an hour and forty-five minutes to do, stopping many times for pictures and just enjoying the scenery. If you are lucky you may see Bighorn Sheep grazing up high on the rocky canyon walls. I’ve never been lucky. More and more people eventually began to appear and I thought it best to head on back. The return trip was only an hour thank goodness. I had misjudged my water and was down to one last sip at trails end. I wanted to stop at the visitor center but the parking lot was packed; there was a line at the restrooms and people milled around in the dozens. I looped through the parking lot and decided next time. I drove on to Yaqui Wells south from the little town and the State Park headquarters where I found one of our usual boondocking camp spots and rested for the remainder of the day with more wind for company.
The next day I wanted to ride my bike up the canyon to where I had caught butterflies twenty some years ago (I don’t engage in such horrific acts anymore). I expected water in the stream as before but none was present. In fact it was nothing was I remembered it. Does the desert change that much in twenty years or has my memories deteriorated that much in twenty years? I left for camp on a different route with wind in my face, on an uphill slope, in soft sand. Twenty minutes later I made it to the road junction a bit beat. After a drink of water and a short rest I was ready to continue on back to camp. Now it was slightly downhill, the wind now pushed me along at a good clip and I rarely had to peddle any save for a few short hills. Seven miles total but it felt like I had done twice as much.
We left camp crossing the highway over to Tamarisk Campground and found it to be closed after everyone cleared out. “We are only open two days a week” the ranger ladies said. Welcome to bankrupt California. So it was back to Borrego Springs Campground. I missed getting our same site back by a few minutes and had to settle for the one across the way. I walked the campground smelling steaks on the barbeque along the way. We need to do this, bring steaks. I showered (the one good feature for this campground) and relaxed for the rest of the day.
The next day I took an alternate trail, longer, a bit more rugged, into Palm Canyon. This was a much enjoyed hike having the trail all to myself under cool overcast skies with just an occasional raindrop. I did not go to the palms as I had done that a few days earlier. I could either backtrack the way I came or take the regular trail out. I did the latter for it was quicker and I was glad I did. Off in the distance I could see a bus load full of college students across the canyon on the longer trail I just completed. I gave the visitor center another try and found it acceptable this time. I bought an easier to use bird guide. Now to use it. Around the center were all the cactus plants and flowers that are in the park so if you want to see and photograph it all with little effort, it’s all there on their Nature Walk. Camp that evening was back to Coachwhip Canyon where we spent our first night. The wind was there waiting for us.
It is the still and quiet of desert mornings that I love. Around eight-thirty A.M. we left Anza Borrego State Park northward to Joshua Tree National Park. Several miles down the road my stomach began to gurgle (I’ve deleted the undesirable bits of my journal at this point. Believe me, you don’t want to be reading it). Gradually I began to feel better and continued on to Coachella stopping at a market for some food including steak. I like skirt steak but here the Mexicans (you’d swear you were in Mexico by being here) call it “flap steak”. On to Joshua Tree where I selected a fairly level site in Cottonwood Campground at the south entrance to the park. Despite my earlier intestinal problems I immediately took off for a 2.6 mile hike up to Mastodon Peak and back down having a wonderful time. I walked around the campground a little before having to return home to get out of the cold wind blowing outside.
Come morning we were greeted with more cold wind. We left camp and stopped off at the visitor center to pay our fifteen dollar entrance fee then motored slowly along the park road stopping along the way for anything that peaked my interest. The first campground I came to was White Tank with fifteen camp sites. At the very end I backed into #15 for lunch and liking the setting so much I decided to stay. Soon I was off for an hour and a half walkabout in the desert seeing nothing special. It wasn’t until I returned did I discover Desert Chuckwallas living right close to camp. There’s no need to walk miles out into the desert when everything to photograph is right at home. The wind died down as the day wore on but the temperature remained around sixty-degrees. Hmm...not much warmer than back at home in the North Bay.
It was a very cool night and I needed to wear something to sleep in. We left camp, putzed along down the road a few miles and toured the next campground, Jumbo Rocks, with no intent of staying - just looking. A few miles further we arrived at Ryan Campground. I stopped at the first empty site then drove the rest of the loop. That first site was all to be had and it was fine by me and claimed it. I got ready for a hike, ate six mini tortillas and took off for destinations unknown on a trail out of camp. I took my time watching birds along the way and keeping my eye out for a tortoise. I did fine a couple of burrows but no tortoise. A couple came along the trial and we talked. They told me of an old homestead further on over the ridge plus a mine shaft. I now had something for a destination. I eventually found the flattened home site littered with lots of tins. The idea crossed my mind as to look for the toilet area and walked around and around with no luck. I then tried to locate the mineshaft the couple had mentioned. Just when I was about to give up after thirty minutes of searching I finally found it. A grating covered the entrance s that squashed any hope of going in for a look. It was now time to start back but where was the trail? After about nearly fifteen minutes of looking I began to consider the notion of being lost. I started up a small canyon for a ridge knowing (hoping) I’d pick up the trial soon enough. Soon I spotted one of the trail markers I had erected. Had I not replaced that downed post when I was coming in I would have probably went up the wrong canyon. I beat feet for home in forty-five minutes, half the time I took getting there.
The following morning I walked up to a nearby homestead site for which the camp was named after, Ryan, and then moved on up the road to the next campground, Hidden Valley. I missed it and had to backtrack ten or so miles. A short drive around the camp revealed that all the sites were taken. Well it was a Friday after all. We left the park, drove through the desert town of Twentynine Palms then re-entered Joshua Tree at the west corner for Black Rock Campground. With one-hundred sites I felt sure we would get a spot. No such luck. Even though there was hardly anyone there, everything was reserved out. The park ranger lady told us of Joshua Tree Lakes RV Park about fifteen miles away to the east. I found the place out in the middle of nowhere. It looked to be in the developing stages but fit my needs and showers were a big plus. I asked the girl how anyone could find them since I noticed no signs along the way. “Well we don’t advertise much as we don’t want too many people here since we’re not quite that ready.” We picked a spot way out by the end with a nice view. About an hour later this yahoo from Idaho pulled up alongside leaving his obnoxious diesel engine running while trying to unload his fifth wheel. When the husband and wife started going back and forth shouting commands to each other, I moved up a row. Surprisingly by day’s end the place gathered quite a few people from tenters on up, most all I suspect were overflow from the Joshua Tree. Why advertise when you can rely of the Joshua Tree rangers to send everyone your way? While there I phoned my aunt Florence in Glendale and told her we were nearby and would come by for a visit. She would be one-hundred years old in a little over a month.
It was a late start in the morning as we were not looking forward to driving into the cesspool of Los Angeles. I made a stop for groceries and fuel in Twentynine Palms then pressed on into the pit. Traffic moved along smoothly all the way thank goodness and only at the end for the last few miles was there any confusion in directions between Map Quest, the GPS and my trusty AAA map. Finally we were close-by, saw a Del Taco and stopped for a quick lunch. That was a first and last time for a Del Taco! It was now one P.M. After a two hour visit (I didn’t want to wear her out) said good-bye and stopped for a quick beer (hell, she wore me out!) and made the escape from Los Angeles. Lord, that place needs a 9.0 earthquake in the worst way. I had two campgrounds picked out in Acton about a half an hour or so away. Again there was some confusion among the three navigation systems in use but finally arrived only to discover Robin’s Nest RV Park was closed down. Back up the road a mile to a KOA and thirty-four dollars and thirty cents later we were camped with full hook-ups and Wi-Fi internet. It had been a long day and I was just this side of being toast.
In the morning I made a final dump of the tanks right at our spot and we were on our way to the poppy fields. The weather was gloomy, overcast and windy. It seems like every time I go to the California Poppy Reserve in Antelope Valley, weather conditions are always against me. I paid the eight dollar fee, parked and went out for some picture taking doing the best that I could under the windy conditions. I walked a trail to the top of a nearby hill wearing two pairs of pants, three shirts, a poncho, my bright blue knit cap and was barely comfortable. Meanwhile short pants, tank tops and flip-flops were to be seen on many of the visitors. In spite of the cold windy weather people were here in numbers, ever increasing as time wore on. Oddly half the people were Asians–enough to fill two tour buses. These people were tromping about in the fields ignoring signs to ‘Stay on Trails’ and oblivious to the shouting of park personnel “Stay out of the Fields!” They’d hog the paths making it difficult for oncoming pedestrian traffic to pass by. The concept of walking in single file is not in their intellect. The presence of these rude inconsiderate people with more bus loads arriving hastened my departure.
I left the poppy fields heading for Red Rock Canyon State Park stopping in the nearby dusty town of Mojave for a bucket of chicken for dinner. My favorite site, #6 was available as only a few campers were in the park. I went to go pay for our spot, twenty-five dollars. Back at camp I dressed as warm as I could although conditions were a bit better here than at the poppy fields, then went for a walk-about as I always enjoy doing here at Red Rock Canyon State Park. The next day I faced the all-day drive for home where it was still raining and...seasonably cold.