We drove in the east entrance of Joshua Tree National Park. The park is huge and with varied landscape. At first one notices rocks that seem to have bubbled up from within the earth and are now laying around at various angles. It is easy to have an urge to climb some of them, and you can if it is one of the 10,000 climbing routes in the park. The rock here is called White Tank Granite, comprised of feldspar, quartz and biotite minerals. The igneous rock was pushed up from deep within the earth, forced into the over-lying rock about 135-150 million years ago …. dinosaur time. There are numerous trails to hike; we selected the Arch Trail. At this moment in time it is an arch. However remember, this is only a moment in the geologic lifetime of the arch. Erosion will continue and someday there will be no arch! (I have included 2 photos of the arch so you can get a sense of its size when you locate the man in the photo!)

The 3 minerals mentioned above were a molten mass of magma forming the granite. There can be other minerals pushed into cracks, taking form in fractures, and more resistant to erosion thus forming what are called dikes. Precious minerals are often found in these areas. See the fracture line with the more resistant rock in the photo below? That is a dike.

Every time I visit this park I remember the cholla cacti forest. Thousands of cholla cacti grow in a particular area and you can walk on a trail in this forest of cacti. Although you may wish to touch the cacti … do not … the barbs on their needles will stick with you and hurt! (We carry a hair pick when we mountain bike in areas with cholla just in case we accidentally hit this cacti.)

The Joshua tree is seen more often as you continue your drive west through the park. In reality it is not a tree at all, but a yucca plant. It is a strange looking plant and anyone with an imagination could probably conjure up all sorts of stories especially if telling it in the dark! Arms seem to squirt out of the plant at crazy angles; the trunk is formed in time from the dead leaves folding down on itself. They grow to a max height of 40 feet and have been known to live hundreds of years! Here are a couple of photos of the trees:

We passed many campgrounds requiring reservations. There is a 14 day limit and more important to know: no water is available. Every campground was full and obviously this seems like the best time to be in the desert … whether on the lower Colorado Desert or the higher Mohave Desert … both are in this park.

Our final stop was Barker Dam. The dam was originally built in the 1900’s by ranchers needing water for their stock. Years later the natural water tank was expanded with catch basins for rainfall and run-off and eventually a dam was built. There was so much water at that time it was known to have covered 20 acres of land! Unfortunately, cattle ranching died out because rainfall decreased. It sort of makes you think about watering holes for wildlife and to wonder with our current drought worries how long they will last. Now just the dam and a water trough are evidence that water used to be here. I imagine certain times during the year water does collect here and more than the 8 birds I saw on this visit do come through. Here are photos at the dam:

There are many places to spend time in this park. Some trails have pictographs providing evidence of Native American tribes being in the are, evidence of very clean air with beautiful lichen growing on the rocks, and along the road plenty of signs to explain what you are looking at. We could leave the park by either the north or west entrance and since we have been here other times we headed out the west entrance. When you decide to visit: plan for the weather and remember to bring snacks and water … go and enjoy this unique area of the world!