Cool California

Today I give you more pictures of California, this first being a fairy land scene of Idyllwild in the mountains near Palm Springs. We went into a chancey-looking restaurant and were surprised to meet a humorous waitress and excellent staple food.

On our four-hour Hummer tour up to Joshua Tree National Park we stopped at this oasis on the San Andreas Fault, easily marked by the massive palms sucking up the water created where the two plates come together, forming the fault. At least I think that is what we learned! We absolutely loved this spot and were sad that the driver wanted to move on so quickly. What a lovely natural discovery. Notice the old palm fronds of years past on the lower part of the trees. These were new to us.

We bumped and slid for an hour and a half up the trail to see the Joshua trees which only grow at high altitudes. Hubby and I are standing in front of one of the larger ones.

Hummer tour! That sounds awesome, we all thought. This is the tired but still sturdy Hummer we rode in for the tour, which did the job twisting and turning around rocks, finding a trail up the mountain where basically none existed. And on the way down, we actually met a Ford Explorer trying to negotiate the same trail. Sitting much lower than the Hummer I am sure the Ford got stopped very soon after we saw it as the rocks were so huge he wouldn't have made it. And there's no AAA out there!

Another day, at the Andreas Canyon Indian Reservation we discovered this lovely sanctuary for hummingbirds. Look closely to see several flying around. There were about fifteen that we could see coming and going.

Sometimes I wonder why I take so many pictures on trips but when I come home I find they help me remember our great discoveries, indexing our finds forever. Cool!