matthewp
Combat Truck Monkey
Last Friday afternoon I had arranged to pick up my just-completed off-road trailer form the gentleman who built it (The trailer was great and I had no qualms with the price for the quality of work done but I need to learn to weld. I feel like I'm missing out on the fun of building!). My wife, Kristy, our dog, Bear, and I decided to head down to Joshua Tree National Park for an over-nighter.
Our plan was to stay at White Tank (recommended by folks on this forum) but all the campsites were marked as full. The ranger at the gate said to go ahead and check the campsites anyway as we were arriving at noon and that is check-out time for campsite stays. We did find a nice little spot at Bell(e)[spelling dependant on whether you are reading the park map or the road sign!
] campsite.
The plan for Saturday was to tour around the Park, seeing a couple things like the Geology Tour road (Skipped the side trip down Berdoo bue to the look of enthusiasm for off-roading that Kristy had due to her headache!:violent-smiley-031. We also saw Key's View and Barker's Dam.
Sunday was to follow Old Dale Road and Gold Crown road out..... THAT wasn't quite what we expected! Gold Crown was a LOT rougher than we planned (at least the fear of getting stuckin the middle of nowhere motivated Kristy to support the purchase of the winch for my new bumper!:wings. The Jeep and trailer did fine, so it was a great time had in the end.
Our campsite... Under a rather large rock. I really enjoyed the setting at a lot of the campsites. The individual campsites were arranged around the rocks. This rock formation was large enough to have 10 sites around it, many of them seperated by smaller rocks.
The new off-road trailer really made things nice, especially for Bear who now has the entire back seat of the Jeep to himself! For all his sad looks, he really is a pampered puppy!
Bear even gets to eat first!
A White-tailed Antelope Ground Squirrel (And we thought it was a chipmunk!).
A westward view of the Coachella valley seen from Key's view. The dark ridge on the desert floor in the mid-ground is actually the San Andreas fault.
The reason the park was named, a Joshua Tree. Also known as a Yucca Brevifolia to all those boring scientifoc types!
Many of the rock formations around the park are awesome the way they look as though they have just been piled up on the desert floor.
An afternoon shot of a Joshua tree in the rock canyon heading to Barker's Dam, a man-made watering hole from back in the cowboy days.
There really is a Barker's dam at Barker's Dam!
Kristy got a great shot of the flowers in the rocks behind our camp.
Our plan was to stay at White Tank (recommended by folks on this forum) but all the campsites were marked as full. The ranger at the gate said to go ahead and check the campsites anyway as we were arriving at noon and that is check-out time for campsite stays. We did find a nice little spot at Bell(e)[spelling dependant on whether you are reading the park map or the road sign!
] campsite.The plan for Saturday was to tour around the Park, seeing a couple things like the Geology Tour road (Skipped the side trip down Berdoo bue to the look of enthusiasm for off-roading that Kristy had due to her headache!:violent-smiley-031
. We also saw Key's View and Barker's Dam.Sunday was to follow Old Dale Road and Gold Crown road out..... THAT wasn't quite what we expected! Gold Crown was a LOT rougher than we planned (at least the fear of getting stuckin the middle of nowhere motivated Kristy to support the purchase of the winch for my new bumper!:wings
. The Jeep and trailer did fine, so it was a great time had in the end.Our campsite... Under a rather large rock. I really enjoyed the setting at a lot of the campsites. The individual campsites were arranged around the rocks. This rock formation was large enough to have 10 sites around it, many of them seperated by smaller rocks.
The new off-road trailer really made things nice, especially for Bear who now has the entire back seat of the Jeep to himself! For all his sad looks, he really is a pampered puppy!
Bear even gets to eat first!
A White-tailed Antelope Ground Squirrel (And we thought it was a chipmunk!).
A westward view of the Coachella valley seen from Key's view. The dark ridge on the desert floor in the mid-ground is actually the San Andreas fault.
The reason the park was named, a Joshua Tree. Also known as a Yucca Brevifolia to all those boring scientifoc types!
Many of the rock formations around the park are awesome the way they look as though they have just been piled up on the desert floor.
An afternoon shot of a Joshua tree in the rock canyon heading to Barker's Dam, a man-made watering hole from back in the cowboy days.
There really is a Barker's dam at Barker's Dam!
Kristy got a great shot of the flowers in the rocks behind our camp.
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