20161012 – Joshua Tree National Park

Up and out early. Exciting day, off to the Joshua Tree National Park, just 30 minutes down the road.

Well the Joshua Trees are ok, but the rock formations are spectacular. Perhaps they should rename it Awesome Rocks NP. Turns out that may well be necessary as the Joshua Tree is threatened with extinction, due to climate change, and may well have died off by the end of this century. It’s not really a tree but a Yucca and only grows at elevations between 1,300 and 5,000 feet. What’s really narking me is why does it only grow in this altitude range? Well apparently it won’t grow above 5,000 feet because of snow and frost damage, but I can’t find out anywhere why it won’t grow below 1,300 feet.

Another awesome 7 hour NP day. I’ll now have to spend weeks culling 100’s of pictures of rocks, but well worth it, and free with our NP pass.

In order to maintain a sense of balance in this pantomime of an election campaign I’ve decided that on odd days I’ll watch Fox News and on even days I’ll watch MSNBC. Day 1 of the crazy voices from Fox. Will I survive MSNBC tonight? For newspapers I’m reading Wall Street Journal and New York Times.

Perhaps I should just watch reruns of the Magic Roundabout – time for bed said Zebedee.

Kurt’s birthday, 32, where do the years go?

Lazy morning and a trip to Starbucks.

After lunch we drive down to Palm Springs to see what all the fuss is about. Well it’s a vary pleasant town with the centre being full of restaurants, clothes shops and “don’t need, but if brain dead, might want” shops.

It’s that hot that most of the restaurants have mist sprays to keep their outside clients cool. We have similar in Belthorn, it comes naturally and is called rain.

Call in at a supermarket, joy, for the weekly shop. Beer section has the usual parade of nats urine but not a decent beer, even Pilsner Urquel, in sight.

Well it’s a repeat of the big concert tonight through Sunday so we’ve decided to keep a low profile and have a couple of lazy days to avoid the crazy people and their gridlock. Who knows with Bob Dylan being a Noble Laureate there may be even more of the crazy people.

After much digging it seems like the best theory on why the Joshua tree does not grow below 1,300 feet is down to lack of moisture – rainfall and transpiration at lower levels. That also seems to be the reason that alpine trees only grow above a certain altitude.

Lazy morning and then for lunch we have a drive down to La Quinta village. All very swish, but not really much to it. Wendy spots a Trader Joes and a Lidl, so like a couple of intrepid trolley spotters we explore – how sad is that.

Wendy lunches at Panera Bread. Then back home to the secret entrance to our gated community, manned by one TSA reject, but at least there’s no queue. With all the bald pony tale crazies (Dylan fans) around it can take upwards of half an hour to penetrate our ultra secure gated community – who knows what they’re protecting us from is it Paleo-BanTheBombers, flea infested rag headed jihadis or Trumpkins.

Watch Captain Philips in the evening, followed by Poldark and an aged Question Time with some gobby American wench, God only knows why we ever granted her citizenship. It really is about time David got a grip. Raw sewage buckets poised over heads could help them engage brain before gobs.