Joshua Tree visitor center - north entrance

We made it.. and damn it's bright out here!

If you keep making faces, one day it will get stuck like that... or at least it will get stuck on our website

First stop, Hidden Valley picnic area

Paul telling Glenna and Jeff something about the dirt in Joshua Tree. Yeah... riveting

Yup, nothing to see here but cryptobiotic crust

And what's a picnic area without a picnic?

Entrance to nature trail loop

Paul really needs to get a different shirt, backpack, and sunglasses. We have pictures in this same outfit from exactly a year earlier!

Welcome to lizard central (they were everywhere)

Closeup of the kind of granite rock Joshua Tree is famous for... and excellent at exfoliating when you fall on it.

What's a trip to Joshua Tree National Park without pictures of actually Joshua Trees?

Finally, those rock climbing shoes actually see rock after 10 years of neglect.

And Laura breaks in her shoes on real rock

Ta-da!

One of the walls used by the UCLA intermediate rock climbing classes back when Paul used to help teach it.