Joshua Tree NP - 49 Palm Oasis Hike

The last hike that we did in Joshua Tree NP was a 3-mile (4.8 km) long hike to the 49 Palm Oasis. Anil decided not to go with us as his knees were hurting, and he was waiting for us next to the car. It was a hot day, so Bartek and I did not want him to wait for us for too long, so we did speed-hiking and were back at the parking lot in 1h 15min. Even though we hurried so much, we still saw many lizards, a beautiful green zebra snake, and several cacti.

Still, if you have time for only one longer hike in the park, I would recommend the Lost Palm Hike over this one. It seems the latter is less traveled, and probably that's why it is way easier to encounter animals there.


Some of the lizards that we met during our hike:






Chuckwallas are huge!


A quail:


Blooming cacti:








Barrel cacti:


49 Palm Oasis:


A short, uncut, unedited movie shot during the hike (we are breathing heavily as we just walked up a bigger hill):

Joshua Tree NP - Indian Cove Nature Walk

I really wanted to go for a nature walk in the Indian Cove with a hope of seeing desert tortoise, which are apparently not unusual there. Unfortunately, we did not manage to see any :(

Still, it was a nice, short (0.6 mile) walk during which we saw many cacti, Mojave yuccas, desert willows, as well as other plants which names I do not know.

Pencil Cholla:


Desert willow:


Joshua Trees:

Joshua Tree NP - Keys View

Apparently, on a clear day the vista from Keys View extends as far as Mexico. Unfortunately, when we were there the air quality was not too good and we could not see even half that far:


Bartek and Mount San Jacinto:


A short (15 sec) uncut, unedited movie shot while driving back from the Keys View to the main park road:

Joshua Tree NP - Skull Rock Hike

Skull Rock is located just next to the main road passing through Joshua Tree NP and there is a parking spot across the road from the rock. Therefore, the majority of the park's visitors stop there only for as long as it takes to take a picture of the rock and then leave to explore other parts of the park.

We, however, decided to go for a 1.7-mile (round trip) nature trail connecting Skull Rock with nearby Jumbo Rocks Campground. Multiple boulder piles located along the trail make this hike very attractive. We did not venture to explore any of them, but I could see how that would be a lot of fun.

Skull Rock:


Bartek, Anil and I, in front of Skull Rock:


During the hike we also saw another rock resembling face. We wouldn't have seen it, if we hadn't gone for a hike:

Joshua Tree NP - Arch Rock Hike

The Arch Rock hike is a short (0.5-mile) nature walk that leads through some of the most interesting geological features of Joshua Tree NP. So we were told. Unfortunately, our understanding of geology is extremely limited, and we only group rocks into 2 categories: pretty or not. Luckily, Arch Rock belongs to the category "pretty" and we had fun scrambling on top of it and taking pictures of ourselves with the rock.

My husband, a rockstar :)


Interesting "uplifted" rocks:


We thought that more appropriate name for Arch Rock would be "Elephant Rock":


Bartek, Anil and I in front of Arch/Elephant Rock:

Joshua Tree NP - Cholla Garden

My dearest friend Bartek joined us on the second day of our stay in Joshua Tree NP and we continued exploring the park with him. The first place that we saw together was "Cholla Garden", which is a place of dense concentration of Cholla Cactus. There is 0.25 mile long nature walk leading through it, during which you can learn many interesting things about the life and reproduction of Cholla.

Cholla is also known as a jumping cactus. The name comes from the ease with which its stems detach when brushed. Even the slightest touch will make the bits of cactus jump at you and cling to you and your clothes. So even though it does look pretty and soft, do not touch it! Its spines will go deep into your skin and it will be very hard to remove them.

The warning sign at the beginning of the trail:


Blooming Cholla:


My husband and Cholla in all their glory and beauty :)

Joshua Tree NP - Lost Palm Oasis Hike

It must have been at least 110 degrees Fahrenheit (43 Celsius) and absolutely no shade when we arrived at Joshua Tree NP. We decided to first set up a tent, and then go hiking, as we hoped heat would lessen later in the afternoon.

At around 4:30 pm (~ 3.5h before sunset) we set out for a 7.2 miles (11.6 km) long hike to the Lost Palm Oasis. That was an excellent choice as it was one of the best hikes that I did in 2010. The views were not spectacular and it was unbearably hot (I was wearing a wet scarf and a wet cap on my head to prevent heat stroke), but the number of interesting animals and plants that we saw there was simply astounding. Every few meters we would encounter a new lizard, bird or plant. It was also the first time in my life that I saw a chuckwalla, several two-horn lizards, and even a rattlesnake!

The rattlesnake waited for us near the end of our hike, and gave us a lot of trouble passing next to it. It was a very frustrating situation: we could already see our car, we were maybe 10-15 minutes away from it, and we found ourselves unable to get to it...

Every time we tried to take a step forward, the rattlesnake was starting to rattle! There was no way that we could go around it either, as there were rock boulders both to the left and to the right of the snake. Scrambling through them did not look as much fun, and also, we decided that it was very likely that there would be other snakes there. And it would have been much more difficult to run away from a snake on the boulders. It was also not helping our situation that the sun was pretty low at that point in time and it was slowly starting to get dark...

Therefore, we (husband) decided that our best option was to try to pass in front of the snake. We tried to walk as far away from the snake as possible, which was maybe like 5 feet (1.5 meter) away... Trust me, it was definitely to close as for my comfort zone... Luckily, the snake decided to give us a break (probably it could smell our fear) and let us pass through.


During the hike we saw lots of lizards. Next to photos show a male and a female of the same species:




A two-horn lizard:


Other lizard:


Jack Rabbit hiding in the shade:


Apparently this beetle stands on its head when it pretends that is dead...


Blooming Ocotillo and a bird:


Some plants that we saw during our hike:






















The Lost Palm Oasis:




We were so excited about seeing the rattlesnake that my hands were trembling and I was unable to take a good picture of it. Also, my dearest husband forgot to take a movie of it, which would have been awesome as you could hear the rattling on it...