I’ve been itching to go to the desert for some time now. I’ve never been before, and I’ve always wanted to go. My grandparents on my dad’s side loved the desert, so I put it on my list as something I wanted to experience in my life. When we planned this trip to California, we realized that Joshua Tree National Park was about a 3 hour drive from San Diego, so we obviously had to go.
First stop was to grab coffee at Joshua Tree Coffee Company. It was really really good coffee. I always get decaf now, but I actually think I shouldn’t have any coffee at all because I still got heart palpitations.
We stopped at Noah Purifoy's Outdoor Desert Art Museum which was…. interesting. So random, but there were a couple cool things if you’re into it lol. The creator of the museum calls his pieces “Environmental Sculpture” and intended it all to be displayed in their natural environment and show the process of decay.
Entrance to the actual National Park was around $30 and it was good for 7 days. We only had 1 full day in Joshua Tree; we didn’t even know the pass was good for that long. The trees are so cool there. They’re all kinds of spikey and tall. We had to pull over so I could snap some photos to remember what they look like.
We stopped at the Cholla Cactus Garden where there were thousands of cacti. It was so beautiful with the mountains in the back. (Had to do a little fashion shoot while we were there)
Lemme tell you - it’s rare if I don’t have a clumsy moment. I’m seriously cursed with clumsiness. I barely even tapped (accidentally tapped might I add) a tiny cactus on the ground and it somehow rolled on the bottom of my boot and got stuck in it. I wish I could replay what happened to show you - it all happened in slow-mo for me, and I can’t for the life of me figure out how it happened. But anyway, as “serious” as I may seem, I did have to sit in the dirt with my boot off picking out cactus spikes….
Just so you know how pokey these suckers are I’ve added the below photo of a close up. Jerome actually got scrapped on the ankle just walking past a cactus.
Jerome and I climbed so. many. rocks. It was awesome. I was wearing platform boots, so it was a little irresponsible and difficult, but I feel like it made it that much more fun and exciting because I could easily have slipped and broken my ankle.
We went to see Arch Rock, and it was cool. Jerome and I climbed the boulders across it to get good photos, but I had to have my turn for fashun too, so down I went.
Next, we set off to Skull Rock. The second I saw it I was like, I gotta climb into those eyeballs. It was sooo scary and soo hard to climb up there oh my gosh. Thankfully Jerome’s dad and brother were there to help us get down! I love rock climbing and climbing these things was so much fun, but I’m actually afraid of heights haha.
After our climbing adventures, we stopped for some of our packed lunch and drove off to a lookout spot to watch the sunset. I can’t remember what the place was called, and I tried to look it up, but nothing was ringing any bells! The sunset was so, so nice with the mountains in the back.
It got pretty cold at night, so we wanted to head back to our Airbnb to make a fire and jump in the hot tub. But first we had to pull over to take photos of the pinkest sky after the sun set.
If you’ve been thinking about going to Joshua Tree, gogogogo! Be wary though because there’s no cell service, and our GPS only worked in some places haha. But it’s so beautiful it’s worth it. We only really saw about a quarter of the park! I’d love to spend more time there, and even camp or rent an airstream! Aahh, that’d be so fun, don’t ya think?
x Melissa