adventures

Saturday morning, Adia and I headed over to Joshua Tree, where we backpacked into the apparently little used area around Black Rock.


Backpacker magazine told us the Joshua trees would be flowering but unfortunately was wrong, although we were still glad we went.


Adia hadn't ever been to the desert, and didn't like it at first, though by the end she seemed to appreciate it better. She was upset that there weren't more "real cacti"--saguaro cacti.


We hiked through a couple of areas that had burned.


Never having backpacked in the desert, Adia didn't realize we would need to bring our own water. I carried two gallons, which made my pack super heavy even though I didn't bring a tent, cook gear, or a campstove.



Confusing maps made us overestimate the mileage of our loop, and we wound up coming out of Black Rock after one night, then headed over to the Wonderland of Rocks, which we then discovered was a day use only area. After scouring the map, we figured out that we could camp if we went west of one of the branch trails.


After a beautiful sunset, we retired early to a night so cold the water froze in my water bottle.


We woke up at 5 the next morning to hike out in the dark and get to Barker Dam, where the ranger said we might see the endangered desert bighorn sheep. We arrived at 6:30 to a beautiful sunrise but no sheep.


We finished walking the nature trail before the next people showed up at the trailhead around 7:30. Throughout the morning, we passed only a few cars.


Happily, we finished our Joshua Tree visit by driving through the prolifically flowering Colorado desert, which mostly fulfilled my wildflower needs and justified the flower guide I bought.