Joshua Tree National Park Adventure: Mistakes were made

This is part three of a three part series about a recent day trip to Joshua Tree. In case you missed part one, be sure to read that first here. If you missed part two, you can find that here. Our family happens to own a cabin in Joshua Tree, so we wanted to check out how it was doing. I’d never been to the property site nor to the Joshua Tree National Park, but I was ready for an adventure with little to no internet, on rugged terrain, and with lots of time spent in the car with my aunt, uncle, dad, and grandpa. 

Dear Adventure Avenue,

After lunch, we stopped by the very busy Joshua Tree National Park Visitors’ Center to pick up a map before heading to the park. 

There was a bit of a line to get into the park, but with my grandpa’s Lifetime National Parks & Federal Recreational Lands Senior Pass, we were able to get in for free and much more quickly as once the park ranger saw our card, we were directed into a separate lane where we began a beautiful drive to Barker Dam Trail. 

Joshua Trees lined the side of the road. The rocks appeared almost fake as if someone had stacked them, carefully, one on top of the other. 

Barker Dam Trail

This trail is a little bit deceiving. It starts off nice and easy, flat with shallow stairs carved into the stone where it was necessary. We admired all the grand rock formations against the brilliant blue sky. It was a beautiful day. 

About halfway into the hike, it became a bit more treacherous. While this trail is listed in the same section as trails that may be wheelchair accessible, it is not one of those trails. It requires stepping up and down large rocks and walking on a narrow rock edge in the middle of the hike. If you have trouble traversing uneven terrain, this is not the hike for you. 

The dam

On this hike, we saw the water tank built by early cattle ranchers as well as the dam. We went a little out of our way to also see the petroglyphs. It isn’t far from the trail and the signs do a very good job of leading the way there and back onto the main trail so that you can get back to the car. 

Petrographs

On our way back, my aunt and I went ahead to catch up with my grandpa who had skipped the petroglyphs in favor of walking back to the car. During this time, my dad gave incorrect directions to a French couple and they ended up where we had parked our car, not where they had parked their car.  

Discovery Trail or rather, the Skull Rock Trail

If you try to do Discovery Trail, be warned, you will probably not actually be on it. It is not well marked. We thought we were on it until we could see a large rock formation that we had passed on our way to the Discovery Trail. 

It turned out we were actually on Skull Rock Trail which was a much longer hike than Discovery Trail. When we got back to Skull Rock (where the trail ended), we tried to go in the opposite direction for Discovery Trail, but then ended up doubling back because it was poorly marked and approaching dusk. 

This tight squeeze should’ve been our first clue that we made a mistake.
Skull Rock

We decided that it was time to head home, so we took the scenic route out of Joshua Tree, towards Cottonwood Center. On the long drive out we saw a couple of the gardens and the changing deserts. Oh did I mention the drive was long? Some people may have been complaining (though not I as the scenery was lovely, but not as breathtaking as entering the park from Joshua Tree). 

A view of one of the gardens on our drive out.

Once we finally got out of Joshua Tree, we stopped for dinner in Palm Springs at a great restaurant called Grand Central. I had the pesto chicken Milanese sandwich and a scoop of salted caramel gelato. The fruit that came with my meal was also delicious!

Those berries were so good!

Until next time,

A

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