Joshua Tree

It is a truth universally acknowledged that college students in Southern California must attempt to go camping at Joshua Tree at least once. Even if they hate camping. After all, it's different when there's alcohol involved. It might mitigate the lack of running water.

With this in mind, I join three of my friends in a car bound for the desert. The National Park is 100 miles from campus, and we got a bit of a late start, so it's nearly dark by the time we get there. Joshua Tree is huge, so we never considered that it might fill up. But this is a holiday weekend, so it shouldn't really surprise us when we get turned away at the gate. It does though. We're disappointed and wondering if there's another campsite nearby. The last thing we want to do is drive all the way back to campus tonight.

The park ranger assures us that there is another campsite. It isn't even that far, just on the other side of the highway. She hands us a slip of paper with directions and wishes us well. While Jen's turning the car around, I examine the paper. The place looks sketchy, but we're young and reckless and determined to go camping tonight. So I guide Jen from Joshua Tree to the overflow camping.

From Hwy 62, turn north on Sunfair Road and travel for two miles to Broadway. Turn right (east) on Broadway. The pavement will end about 100 yards after this turn. Travel one mile to a line of telephone poles running perpindicular (north and south). This one lane, unmarked dirt road is Cascade. Turn left (north) and travel 1/2 mile until a single lane, unmarked dirt road is passed. This road is Sunflower. Camping is allowed for the next 1/2 mile on the east side of Cascade.

We make our way along the one-lane roads slowly, wondering if something with this many potholes can really be called a road. But it isn't too long before we encounter another group who didn't make it into the park that night.

We find something that looks like it's probably a campsite and pull over. We get the tent set up and pull our the beer, determined to enjoy ourselves out in the middle of nowhere. The fields run off in all directions, with no indication of civilization. Except for the glow of Los Angeles in the distance. The city washes out most of the stars, even this far away from it, leaving me missing my mountains. The upside is that this campsite is free and secluded. And we're still close enough to Joshua Tree to go hiking there in the morning. But the entire trip ends up being an important lesson in planning ahead.