Yucca Valley 2020
When you wake up and suddenly realize it's 2020, it's a little shocking to the system, wasn't it just the Y2K scare last year?
January 1, 2020
In the morning we wandered around our local desert, admiring the wild desert, and the variation of houses in the area. Adobe style, ultra modern, assorted ranchers, and then the really unique (odd), such as the dome style homes that seem to be unique to the high desert.
The desert weather and less severe cold (except for when we are there to escape winter) allows more flexibility in construction, the dome house near us wasn't quite as nice as some of the others we saw, and what the heck is this place that looks like an abandoned UFO?
Today was another wildlife day of bird and bunny watching for Silva, even the Roadrunners were running around, apparently they don't make Silva as angry as our local black crows do..
For the evening entertainment we decided to make a run into Palm Springs and check out the Cabazon Outlet mall. It's the smaller and less fancy cousin of the Desert Hills Premium Outlets. At least we had a nice sunset on the way there, because there really wasn't any great deals to be found.
Since we didn't spend much time shopping we headed over to the Sizzler, a restaurant that used to be very popular near our home and famous for their salad bar. All of our Sizzlers closed down when the Salad Bar fad started going away, but they are going strong down here, and the Salad Bar was hopping. Add that to their seafood specials and we drove home feeling very full.
January 2
I had this great idea that since it was January 2nd, that everyone would have gone home after the holidays, and we could go back to Joshua Tree Park and explore some of the other areas. Boy was I wrong, it was even crazier than the last time we were there. So I made the executive decision to head to the opposite side of the park and check out the Coachella valley preserve.
Coachella Valley National Wildlife Refuge is a 3700 acre protected area. The refuge contains the majority of critical habitat for the Coachella Valley Fringe-toed Lizard. After chatting with the park hosts, we decided to hike out and try to reach the 3 key areas; the palm oasis and pond, the ridgeline walk, and the box canyon. From the parking area you wind through a thick forest of Palm Trees, wooden walkways keep you above the marshy ground, and lead into a more rugged desert terrain.
Hidden in the trees and behind a rehabilitation fence for some work they are doing is a small pool that creates a natural breeding ground for numerous creatures including several species of owls.
Once you pass the pool area, it is pretty much open desert, the trail slopes up to a ridge, where you can walk along and see the desert and surrounding mountains.
It was a nice warm day in the valley, so we made sure we had lots of water and drank as we hiked, and kept an eye on our watches as the park closed at 4:30. Just as we were considering when we should turn around we came into the box canyon, at first a wide canyon, and then it gradually got narrower and narrower.
The infamous Coachella Valley Fringe-toed Lizard
Estimating how long it took us to get into the canyon, we knew it was time to head back, through the desert and into the Oasis again.
After our big long hike, we made the mistake of listening to our GPS for the best route back into Palm Springs so we could go to the Thursday Night VillageFest and get Silva some more Pork jerky. After figuring out that we didn't need to go into the mountains to get there, and slowly driving past the Palm Springs International Film Festival crowds, we got some more of Silva's new favourite treats.
Sadly, when we got back to our place, Silva was not doing well. She was lethargic, didn't want to eat, and would lay down after peeing. It was a good thing we had a vet appointment already booked the next morning to get her some meds she was running out of.
January 3
This day was not a good day. The first vet we went too was I think a little overwhelmed by Silva's medical history, and created panic and fear when they improperly took her temp and listened to her lungs. "Her temperature is low, her lungs sound terrible". Fearing the worst she sent us to a specialist clinic in Ontario, CA... a 1.5 hour teary drive from Yucca Valley.
When we arrived, they rushed her in, and we anxiously waited for some news. Several hours later the doctor came out... "NO, her temperature is not low, it's normal. Her lungs sound ok to me, for a dog with her issues, but we want to do some more tests". Blood tests, X-Rays all came back fine, in fact compared to previous X-Rays done in Canada, they looked like a slight improvement. There was some Liver irregularities, but she suspects she must have strained something in her back or back legs.
Much later that night, we drove back to Yucca Valley with a bag full of medication, and a hefty Mastercard charge.
January 4/5
The next couple of days would be low key days, we sat outside by the pool, and let Silva relax. She was pretty slow, and didn't have much of an appetite or any energy it seemed. At least we were able to get her to eat some of her new treats and some grilled ground pork.
We caught up on a few good books, and enjoyed a couple very nice sunsets.
January 6
Silva seemed to be doing a little better, was eating ok, and was a little more like a very tired version of herself, so we decided to head off one last time to Joshua Tree, this time she was coming along for the ride. The best news was the whole park was pretty deserted, no traffic, no crowds, and no Instagram girls.
Our main destination and first stop was the Keys view. From this point you overlook the Coachella Valley, from the Salton Sea to Palm Springs, and all the mountains and peaks in between, including the San Andreas Fault.
From the top of the park, we wound our way back down to check out the spots that were too busy to see the last time we were here. Mostly that meant stopping and looking at rocks, it looks a lot different through here when most of the snow is gone.
Did I mention it was mostly stopping and looking at rocks? The rock formations here are unique to Joshua Tree, Australia and Antarctica, formed over millions of years through friction, melting, erosion and the shifting of earth's tectonic plates... fascinating.
Dog's aren't allowed on the hiking trails, but there is some great little picnic areas in Hidden Valley where we can stop and let Silva chill out as she's still not the biggest car ride fan.
It's a nice day in Joshua Tree park when you don't have to fight the holiday crowds. We hit most of our must see spots, and most of the must see rocks, so it was time to head back up into our Yucca Valley Hills, our "Operation Escape Winter" time is almost over.
January 7
Our last day of sitting out front and watching bunnies, quails and roadrunners wandering around our place.
It was a day of packing up, eating the last of our food, and watching one more spectacular sunset.
January 8
Suddenly our time in Yucca Valley was over, three weeks flew by incredibly fast. We'll miss our Adobe Getaway, but we loaded up the last of our stuff, got Silva in the back, and hit the road.
It was...