Joshua Tree National Park
Joshua Tree National Park is about an hour from where we are staying Palm Springs. We headed that way this morning, not knowing what to expect, other than Joshua Trees. Joshua Trees are cool, but the real beauty of the park is the huge piles of rock that have evolved there over time. The best thing of all is that you are encouraged to go off the trail and climb on the rocks. The kids had a blast with this part.
While we were there we went on a couple of hikes, drove to an overlook, and the kids earned their Jr. Ranger badges, of course.
Vasquez Rocks
Not far from our campground is Vasquez Rocks, a cool rock formation that has been featured in many shows and movies. We spent some time this afternoon exploring and climbing. It was neat.
Hollywood!
UC Santa Cruz Arboretum
Surfing!
I don’t remember when it started, but as far back as I can remember I have wanted to be a surfer. I have always loved the beach and I think the thrill of surfing combined with beach life has always attracted me. Surfers are the coolest, right?
Surfing is the only thing on my bucket list, and today I got to cross it off! With my parents in town to help watch the little girls, Susan, Andrew, Mari, Elliot, and I got to spend the afternoon surfing, which was awesome. We signed up for lessons a couple of weeks ago with one of the surf schools here in Santa Cruz. They provided the boards and wet suits, and two instructors.
After getting dressed and carrying our boards to the beach, which was quite a task, we had a short on-shore lesson. Rick & Gio taught us a few fundamentals (don’t ever look down) and how to stand up, and then it was into the water. The water was flat all day, but just as Rick planned the waves started coming up our of nowhere as the tide went out.
The waves were just perfect for us to get started on and the cove we were in was great. We could stand with the water up just past our waist about 100 yards out into the bay. We would wait for a group of waves and then Rick and Gio would give us a push and tell us when to stand up.
The first phase of our lessons was learning how to stand up and ride the wave the whole time. The next phase would be learning how to paddle into the wave (get started by yourself). They said that if you start out that way then you can get exhausted very quickly and not have any fun at all. I can see that because by the end of our two-hour lesson we were all pretty much exhausted.
All of the kids were great at surfing. They picked it up much quicker than Susan and I. I think they were successful about 75% of the time. Rick & Gio were most impressed with Mari, who picked it up quickly and rode very consistently. Elliot and Andrew were right there with her. Susan and I had a harder time, probably being successful just 25% of the time, but we still had a blast.
It was a great time, and a great blessing for me to have the experience with the rest of my family.
Mar-Mar and Be-Bob played with the girls at the beach, which was great because my mom took a bunch of pictures for us while my dad played in the sand. I think we were all ready to leave at about the same time and then we went out to eat on the wharf, a pier right by the beach. There was a beautiful sunset.
Monarch Migration
There is a state park in Santa Cruz, Natural Bridges, where thousands of monarchs spend their winter. They are attracted to a stand of Eucalyptus trees in a narrow canyon just off the coast. There is a trail down into the canyon where you can gaze that the clumps of butterflies up in the trees. As the temperature warms up many of them take flight and go from tree to tree.
Friday in Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz
Today we went for a walk in Santa Cruz. We parked just north of the city and then walked down the coast to the wharf, a pier with a bunch of shops on it. We stopped for a while to watch the surfers and start taking notes for our lesson on Monday.
Mirror Lake Hike
Our third trip into Yosemite brought us back into the valley, for the mirror lake hike. It was a nice, relatively flat loop around mirror lake, which is mostly dry this time of year. One of the most exciting things is that we were very close to a bear and did not even know it. We were bummed that we missed it. A family hiking the other way said they had to turn around and wait for the bear to clear the trail. The group in front of us saw it, but not us. 🙁
Angel Falls
Bass Lake is not far from our campground. There are many hikes around that area and today we did the Angel Falls hike. It was a short hike to a cool spot where a creek has carved out the granite, similar to the swimming hole at our RV park. Luckily the water was not flowing too fast, so we could get out and explore some. It is the first time in a while that we have had the little girls on their harnesses.
Swimming Hole
There is a river that runs near our campground and at the end of the campground there is swimming hole. Today we spent about a hour playing around the area. It is really neat because it is all carved out of granite, similar to Yosemite.
