Although compared to some my experiences would seem trivial at best, I'm no stranger to being outdoors. I grew up learning the salient skills of a boy scout from my grandfather and since have had plenty of opportunities to use them while camping in the mountains of New England. Though not something I do often, I have stark confidence in my ability to not die if lost or left alone in the wilderness for an extended period of time. In all my experiences throughout the mountains and boondocks of New England and the Appalachian trails as a kid and young adult, I have never had so much fun and such an amazing experience camping as I did this weekend here in California.
Almost 2 years ago I moved here to Los Angeles. It's a great city! I love how busy it is all the time, the people, the noise, the pollution, I love it all. In all the time I've been here however I've just recently become privy to a 750,000 acre National Park known as Joshua Tree. This is where my story begins...
Joshua Tree is about 3.5 hours east of Los Angeles and is about as big as the city itself. The park is as long as the drive is initially, so in order to reach the eastern border of the park one would need to effectively double the driving distance. After about 100 miles east from Los Angeles, Route 10 takes you right through the middle of an amazing wind-farm. Surrounded on all sides by towering wind turbines one can't help but to be in awe on your first pass through. I'd only seen them in the movies, and they are indeed quite awesome in real life. Although not gusty at all times, the winds in that area do pick up quite a bit at some times of the day, effectively keeping the turbines spinning for hours even when there is no wind at all. Shortly after the windfarm the junction with Route 62 will start to take you north through a 5 mile mountain pass that is 100% uphill. As the view opens up on the other side of the pass, you travel another 20 miles or so down an inclined road leading you into a town called Yucca Valley. You might be interested in stopping at the Circle K you'll soon see coming up on the left side, they have gas, coffee, food and a perverted old man working behind the counter that will most certainly ask if you need anything. If you decide to take another left out of the Circle K and continue down Route 62, another 20 miles or so will lead you to the entrance of Joshua Tree National Park.
Nickerson State Park is where a good deal of my camping experiences came from as a youngin. Crowded campgrounds, nosy park rangers and annoying clueless tourists are what you can expect when you camp there. Needless to say, not the most amazing camping situation. You get stopped at a Mr. Burns-like gate as you enter the park where you must stop and pay upwards of $20 per night to stay at a site. They pick the site for you and generally don't give a damn about any needs of yours that don't make their day more cheery. Once in your campsite you can expect a pine green Ford F150 making the rounds through the campgrounds once or twice an hour with two rangers inside peering at each campsite to make sure nobody is "causing trouble". I make it sound terrible I know, but compared to what I experienced with the rangers at Joshua Tree, Nickerson Park is more a prison camp than a park. Not to mention it only costs $10/night.
Emily and I entered the park and pulled up to a booth with a sign that read, "Sorry we're not here, you can pay later." We drove on not exactly sure where to go except for some vague directions given to us by a ranger at the visitor station about a mile or so before the gate. "Keep on drivin', you'll see it!" Nice. It was 20 miles before we came to the area we were looking for, the campground named "Hidden Valley". On all sides we were surrounded by amazing rock formations. I wish I could appropriately describe the scale of these rocks. Some of them were big enough to easily dwarf some of the taller buildings in Los Angeles, these are simply amazing elements of nature. In the middle of the this everlasting expanse of desert are these gigantic rock formations that seem to have formed out of nowhere. Simply breath-taking. We pull in, and drive around looking for an empty campsite. Joshua Tree doesn't except reservations and is 100% first come, first serve. We weren't even positive there would even be a site, but alas we found one at the end of the road and it was excellent! Towering rock formations surrounding us on two sides. On the other sides, the dirt road we entered by and a breadth of desert as far as the eye can see. We had the entire place to ourselves save for the cars driving down every once and awhile looking to see if our site was taken or not.
After unpacking, setting up the tent, sleeping bags, etc. we decided to explore a little and go for a hike. The cliffs behind us were not too difficult to climb and at the top we were lucky to have THE most breath-taking view I have ever seen in my life. Words simply cannot do this any justice, take a look at the pictures.
After some fortuitous searching and spelunking we came across a small opening in the rock providing us a view of the opposite side of the large rock mountain. About waist height and maybe five feet across, this little tunnel wound up being a really fun spot. The wind would rush up the angled cliff face and through the opening causing what was much like a wind-tunnel. With the temperatures easily in the 90's it was incredible to sit on this sun-baked rock face with the cool wind rushing past us. We did some more climbing and made it to the highest point possible from the path we originally took, and decided to go cook some food.
Matches are wonderful, but if somebody out there can teach me how to light a propane grill with wooden matches when the wind is blowing 20mph I will seriously buy them a beer. We had to drive almost 40 miles to get a lighter because I just couldn't do it with matches. 40 miles, $5, and 4 hot dogs later we had full stomachs and were ready for some more climbing.
After we did another round across the cliffs behind our site we came back and decided a nap was a good idea. I have to tell you, taking a nap on a sun-baked cliff 100 feet in the air is really quite awesome. Try it someday. Woke up, drank lots of water, and decided it was time to do some more climbing and tackle a bigger monster. On our first venture around the rock we could easily see the highest peak in the area and tried to make our way towards it. We soon came across an immoderately sized ravine in between our current location and the previously mentioned summit. I gave it a try or two and quickly realized it wasn't going to happen from there. If there was a way up, it was not from where we were then. So here I am a couple hours later fresh from a nap ready to find the elusive path to the top. I brought both my video camera and Emily's digital camera with me on my journey, and spent the next 2 hours circling the circumference of the rock taking pictures, video, and trying to find the path to the summit. After about a dozen attempts to climb different routes, paths and tunnels through the rocks I had to call it quits for the night. I had long since run out of water, the sun was setting and I had been gone far longer than anticipated. I climbed down and followed the road back to our campsite with the unpleasant taste of failure in my mouth.
Have you ever seen a desert sunset from the top of a mountain? It's amazing! Sunset's were a dime a dozen growing up on Cape Cod where we would routinely make fun of tourists coming to watch the sun set over Cape Cod Bay at Rock Harbor. Even if you've seen the sunset a hundred times over the water or even a cityscape, seeing it in the desert is something every person should do at least once. Seeing the entire skyline flash a bright orange and red as the sun disappears over the mountainous horizon was a sight I won't soon forget. Once it was fully set and the light began to fade increasingly fast, we hiked back down from the cliff and made use of the last bit of light by setting up our sleeping bags for the night. We cooked and ate some more food as well as some S'mores before it was completely dark and made one more hike up the cliff to get a good look at the stars. We sat for awhile on the rocks watching the stars and talking about random things until the pain in my legs from earlier hiking told me it was time to sleep.
The next day I woke up with a renewed vigor to conquer the cliff that had so thoroughly defeated me the previous day. On the evening prior, there was one spot I had found with potential to be a route to the summit. While I was up there I came across a juncture where I could either leap across a small chasm, or try to hoist myself up into a crevice with a deep chasm down below. Either one could have been the route to the top, and falling on either would been a broken leg at best, at worst...fatal for certain. At the time, fatigue and thirst combined with a swelling sense of vertigo told me it was best to just say no and try some other way. Well, the next day had come and I had found no other way. Emily and I went together this time, searching for about an hour before deciding if there was a route at all, it was through one of those paths I had found the night before. We made our way there, and to my surprise Emily had no trouble whatsoever climbing to that point of juncture. She constantly amazed me with her fearlessness in climbing and just trying to follow me on my stupid mission to climb this big rock. When we arrived at the point of choice, she decided to stay there and wait and see if I found a route. I chose not to leap and instead to trust my climbing ability and hoist myself up, through and over the chasm. The gap was about the size of a washing machine, but about 100 feet down to the ground. After some self-coercion and a lot of deep breaths I was able to get myself across the cliff face and onto the other side of the chasm. Once I was over, I was slightly surprised at how easy it was from there. I had about ten more feet up of climbing to go, then I was onto a semi-flat ledge that lead me up towards the top. I had 2 more semi-difficult rocks to climb over but none of them comparing to that one point. The adrenaline was flowing now, I couldn't stop, I was so close!! I kept climbing until finally I could see it. The top! One more obstacle now stood in between me and conquering the mountain. A 45 degree cliff face that stretched for about 50 feet and lead to a small bathtub-sized flat spot that was my destination. I was there, no giving up! I sucked up my fear and forced back the dizziness and started to do a spider-man like walk up the cliff face. The closer I got the more confident I became and my fear practically disappeared. Suddenly, I was at the summit. I stood up, and threw my arms up in triumph and just smiled. Looking around from that point was like nothing I had ever experienced before in my life. There's only one thing I'm really afraid of to the point where vertigo sets in, and that is heights. I get dizzy, disoriented, and my body won't respond properly when I'm somewhere very high up. The fact that I had gotten myself to climb to this point despite my fear made me feel so awesome, it made the entire trip worth more to me than any picture or souvenir ever could have. I spent about 5 minutes up there and then climbed back down to see Emily and thank her for all her help and encouragement. I think if I had been with my friends or a group of people I would have concocted some excuse to not climb that high. My leg hurts, or I would have let someone else do it first and steal the excitement which I'd use as an excuse to not go for it. Something like that I'm sure. But with only her with me, and her constant encouragement she really made me want to do it. Not just for her, but she made me want to do it for myself too. Thanks Emily! I can't thank you enough for helping me experience this today, it was truly amazing, and all thanks to you.
We went back to the campsite, packed up our belongings and set in for the what would end up being a 4 hour ride home. I will never forget this trip, and I am incredibly excited to go again as soon as possible. The desert is a truly amazing place and I'm sure my words don't do it any justice. I got home feeling more dirty, greasy, bruised and sore than ever before but at the same time feeling more renewed and excited about life than I have I think ever.
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