The Trees

 After leaving Los Angeles, we took a little inland detour to Palm Springs.  We spent a day visiting Joshua Tree National Park and soaking in the hot springs in Desert Springs.

 We went to Joshua Tree the day after our long hike in the San Gabriel mountains so my legs were already really sore....and I mean REALLY sore.  So we had decided to do a couple really short, easy hikes around JT.

The terrain of JT was very stark.  The mountains were built from rocks that looked as though they were crumbling.  It was almost as thought there were giants wandering the land collecting piles of rock.  It was a very interesting terrain.

 It would have been great to have some more time to spend in the park.  I would love to camp there someday in the future.  I really need to invest in some serious camping gear.  Avery wanted to climb up every pile of rocks.

Driving through the park felt like driving through the forest in the Lorax.  It reminded me of the Truffula trees.  It was like being on another planet.  The park was so big that we could have spent the entire day or even several days there.  

 But when we got to JT, it was really cold and even snowing at the top of the mountain so we just drove around, then headed to the hot springs.  We found a spa that had a day rate of $7 and we spent the day soaking in the mineral waters.