Joshua Tree

We got back this afternoon from a weekend trip to Joshua Tree National Park, about 150 miles from where we live. Some old friends of Rocket Boy's drove up from Arizona to meet us there. They had to drive 485 miles, but without almost-two-year-old twins in the car, so we agreed it was a pretty fair division of driving!

Staying at the hotel with almost-two-year-old twins was challenging. Within minutes of our arrival, Baby A discovered the phone and pressed the button to call the front desk. A moment later he did it again. So we put that phone in the closet and unplugged the other one. The hotel provided 2 little cribs, which the boys immediately figured out how to climb in and out of (this is new). So then they wouldn't go to sleep. We dressed them in their PJs, read stories, put them in their cribs, said nighty-night, and a moment later Baby A was in Baby B's crib and a moment after that Baby B was on the floor. Our room had a little kitchen attached to it, and the second night we were there, the boys decided to bang the cupboard doors open and shut over and over. Then the phone in the closet rang: it was the front desk: someone had complained about the noise! At 8pm! This morning RB let them ride in the elevator (just for fun -- we were on the 1st floor) and Baby A pushed the emergency phone button which calls the fire department.

Joshua Tree is an attractive National Park. I liked it, what I saw of it. Would like to come back and explore it a little more, perhaps with older twins. Desert parks have special challenges for toddlers: notably cacti, as well as other painful plants.

We're walking along a trail, the boys are looking at everything, touching everything, picking up rocks, and all of a sudden there's a prickly pear -- whoops! Grab both babies, hurry them along, and keep eyes peeled for the next hazard. Attractions such as the Cholla Cactus Garden could be viewed only from the car.

Oddly, there are no services inside the park. Even the visitor centers are quite a ways outside it, and there are no restaurants and most of the campgrounds don't even have water. But, you know, every National Park is a little different. The second visit is always easier than the first.

We were early for wildflowers. The ranger at the Oasis Visitor Center told us we wouldn't see much of anything yet; he also said they didn't expect this to be a good year. But as we were driving along the road to the south entrance, we passed a field of ocotillo and many of them were in bloom. Ocotillo are a funny plant -- just a bunch of stems that can grow up to 20 feet tall. According to a guidebook I bought, ocotillo usually look dead, but whenever there is a good rain, their long stems become covered with tiny green leaves -- which then die as soon as the soil dries out. This can happen over and over again throughout the year. They only bloom once a year, with bright red flowers at the ends of their stems. We had never even seen any green ones before, and these were all green and many had red flowers. Quite a sight.

After we drove through the park, we went to the Salton Sea. I have a framed poster (hanging in our family room) of a photo of the Salton Sea by Richard Misrach. I've had it at least 20 years. So now I've finally seen the real thing, or at least a tiny corner of it. It was very beautiful, the only problem being all the dead tilapia everywhere. I wasn't clear on what causes the dead fish -- something about algae. The Salton Sea also has an extremely serious salinity problem. But it's still magnificent. As we walked along the beach, we kept passing dead fish and the babies kept trying to pick them up.

Today (Sunday) our friends headed back to Arizona and we made another quick trip through the park. We wanted to take another nature walk, but it was raining and we hadn't brought the hiking stroller with its special rain cover. Finally we gave up, left the park, and headed home to Ridgecrest.