Change of Plans
Trip Start
Sep 14, 2010
1
7
27
Trip End
Oct 09, 2010
Where I stayed
Renaissance at Palm Springs
Palm Springs, California
Sunday, September 19, 2010
We started this morning in Twenty-nine palms and checked out of the Harmony Motel. We headed over to Joshua Tree National Park and hiked the "Lost Horse Mine" trail. The mine is still there along with some of the equipment that was thrown off to the side after it wasn't needed. A man found gold at this site whilst looking for his horse that got lost in this part of the desert. James commented that if he had been that man, he would have beat that horse good.
Our recommendations for hiking this: start early. The weather at Joshua Tree National Park (which is in the desert) is hot. We started by 8:30 and we were sweating pretty good within an hour. This hike has an elevation change of 800 feet. This was rough on me (Rhonda). The elevation at the top was 5200 feet. Just so you get a rough idea of this, we have found the elevation of Colonial Heights to be listed at 95 to 190 feet.
Something we have struggled with the past couple of mornings is getting the SD card out of the computer and putting it back into the camera. This morning we are a mile into our hike when James takes a picture and sees "Out of Memory". That is a sickening feeling as it takes about 30 minutes to hike a mile since the terrain is rough and you are increasing in elevation at the beginning of this particular hike. He erased a few old photos off there so we have about 4 shots of our mine hike!
After hiking and a few more side trips to crawl on top of the rocks, we headed over to Palm Springs. A big disappointment for us today: We found out the tram that we wanted to ride was closed for renovation until September 25th. This was a setback for us as this was our late afternoon/evening expedition.
Driving into Palm Springs (which took about an hour) one notices the many windmills that are used to gather electricity. We've no idea how efficient this is, but it looked neat from the car window! There are different sized windmills and we noticed the smaller ones spun faster.
Since James had to do some work and we knew we weren't going out this evening, Noah and I decided to just hang out at the pool (which meant being in the pool as it is 104 here today) and then to go out to eat.
Based on Sam H.'s recommendation we went to Marie Callender's restaurant. It was o.k.- the hamburger, fries, and slice of pie were filling.
Since it is Sunday many of the stores were closed downtown so we didn't get any shopping in this evening. Discounting this mornings hike, it was a pretty lazy day.
I'm heading to bed at 9:20 Pacific time and Noah and James are already asleep. I'll bet by the time we get used to Pacific time we'll be back home-ha.
Rhonda
Comments
It looks like you all are having a great time! Jordan wants to know when we can go there. Save your itinerary for us to look over in a couple years. Both the kids wanted me to make sure and tell you they love you all and miss you very much. By the way, I got my first ultrasound done Thursday and everything looks well. Your new grandbaby is currently .85 centimeters long and has a strong heartbeat. My official due date is May 5 so I am about 8 weeks right now. Brandon decided he doesn't want to find out the sex of this baby so it will be a big surprise to all come May :)
Alright, the pool side picture is more like my type of vacation! haha Good to see you all so busy and enjoying the wonderful views. I am tired just reading about it. lol