Joshua Tree National Park
December 30 & 31, 2008

Christmas 2008 and New Year 2009 (3 of 6) :

We had a very enjoyable road trip with Penny and family to Joshua Tree National Park, California to celebrate New Year, 2009. We drove to Twentynine Palms on Tuesday December 30. It's quite a long way - 485 miles and we got stuck in very heavy traffic in the San Bernadino Valley. It took 11 hours to get there. Anyway, we went on a Ranger led walk in the National Park on Wednesday December 31. Very interesting. Ranger Joshua was as interesting as always and took us to a disused mine mill. Along the way we visited the scene of a wild-west murder in 1947. In the afternoon we went for a walk in Hidden Valley. Very beautiful. Joshua Tree NP has been under the management of the Park Service since 1932. It became a park in 1994 when President Clinton signed the "California Desert Protection Act" which also created Death Valley NP and the Mojave National Preserve. Lightbox click here - 3.08 mBytes download
Propane	Cheap Gas	Beautiful Lost Hills
Even cheaper	Wonderful view	Johno's Arriving
Ali and Andrew	Penny	Lizzie
Kate	Ranger Joshua	The windmill
Penny in desert	Alice and Andrew	Angus
Gunned down	Crowd taking photos	Johnsons at scene of crime
Andrew and camera	Bits from old car	The old truck
The Mill	Lizzie at mill	Back of mill
Adobe House	Joshua Tree	Alice and Angus climbing
Angus again	Angus with cactus in hand	The Johnsons
Penny again	Tree in Hidden Valley	Ali at Indian Cove
Robin	Trail sign	Yucca valley2