We spent our last two days in Joshua Tree taking some shorter hikes. Somehow, after days of driving into the park, we missed our turn. I saw on our map that we could take a right at the next road & get back on track. This was the actual marked road. Most of the roads out here look like this, and they are so bumpy!
We decided to go to hike Hidden Valley, & after our success driving along that dirt road before, we decided to take on of the unpaved roads to the hike in the park. The road was so bumpy, we could only go 5-6 mph at the most! (At one point, the kids got out & walked beside the truck.)
We started out at noon. It’s a short trail, but even in April midday gets pretty hot. We got to see a young chuckwalla & what we assumed was its mama on another rock.
On the way out, we realized why it’s called Hidden Valley! Wow! It’s amazing what you can miss when you’re only hiking in 1 direction! This view greeted us as we came out thru the same rocks we’d entered just an hour before!
On the drive out of the parking lot, we saw an injured rattlesnake.
After that, we drove up to Keys View.
Our last day we started our adventure in 29 Palms at The Jelly Donut, an old gas station that’s now a donut shop/Vietnamese restaurant. Then, we drove into the park to enjoy those donuts.
Next was Barker Dam, an actual dam created by cowboys & ranchers as a spot to water their cattle. Like yesterday, we took the unpaved way there! The kids (& TJ for a while) got to ride in the bed of the truck!
Chase spent the evening fixing his RC car’s motor. He has learned so much about fixing this & RC cars in general!
These last 2 days, we spent about 8 hours total planning our next stops. With spring break & random conventions, many campgrounds near national parks were booked. We were lucky enough to find campgrounds just outside the towns (30-40 min drives to the parks on our list).
Our next stops are:
- Las Vegas (to see Hoover Dam & as a jumping-point to the next stop)
- Zion National Park
- Bryce National Park
- Hanksville, UT (random stop, but a jumping-point to the next stop)
- Arches National Park
- Monument Valley & Horseshoe Bend
- Grand Canyon National Park
These take us up to the end of May! We’re excited to spend less time planning & more time learning about all of these amazing places!
Go Big and Go Roam 
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