The Joshua Tree National Park......25th & 27th February....

It's a beautiful morning and our first visit to Joshua Tree National Park which is about 30 miles from our camp site.......
A few short and easy hikes to loosen up the legs ready for some longer hikes in a couple of days time...

The geologic rock formations in Joshua Tree NP are a haven for rock climbers..... not our thing but whatever rocks your boat.....

Back to the name and main feature of the park, the Joshua Tree is a member of the Yucca family and has lovely creamy white flowers at this time of year.....it was named by a group of Mormon settlers who crossed the  Mojave Desert in the mid 19th century......

This cute little chap had his eye on our sandwiches as sadly people do feed the wild life even though asked not to by the park rangers..... and no we did not succumb to his charms......

Rather like the Saguaro cactus in Arizona the Joshua tree is predominant in this area of the Mojave Desert...  

Part of one of our longer hikes on our second visit to the park.....

Split Rock
Along with the Joshua Tree this area has some beautiful rock formations mainly caused by the close proximity to the San Andreas fault.......

Yorkieman and truck at Spilt Rock......man and machine.....

During our 3 mile hike on the Split Rock trail we are again amazed by the balancing rocks ......geologists believe that molten liquid heated by the continuous movement of the Earth's crust oozed upward and cooled, these plutonic intrusions are a granite rock called monzogranite.......

And now we will have short break in transmission as just like Albert Hammond said in his song It never rains in Southern California  but girl don't they warn ya it pours man it pours............and so it did......a major storm arrived and we have had 4 days of high gusting winds and heavy rain.......we did think at one time our little home on wheels would take-off but we are still upright and we are not complaining about the rain as it is desperately needed here in California as they are having a serious drought.......it was not drought breaking rain but it has helped........knock on was that due to flooding and mud from the washes all roads into Palm Springs were closed at one point and The Gene Autry Trail is still closed, we love that name, we have visions of horses clip clopping down the road but it is horsepower of a different kind now and lots of it as it is a very busy main road into town......
Hopefully more "travelblog" soon from Yorkieman and Mrs Blogger........