Author Archives: ontheroadwithdec

This entry will finish off some notes made as we arrived in California and finish with a 6000′ climb in a gondola from the desert floor (near Palm Springs) to the top of the San Jacinto mountains. The temperature dropped about 40 degrees that afternoon and we were actually a bit chilly at the top.Continue reading “A Bit of a California Hodge-Podge”

The desert in this area (Coachella Valley) is almost totally without natural wetlands and that makes the manmade sites valuable to migrants. The sewage lagoons in many desert communities are (now) often made into (vegetated) wetlands and the stunningly large Salton Sea is a remnant of a mis-directed Colorado River from some 105 years ago.Continue reading “The Salton Sea”

The town of Palm Desert is east of the San Jacinto and Santa Rosa mountains, yet only about 50 miles from the coast and has a myriad of destinations for both star-watchers and bird-watchers. The streets are named for luminaries of yesteryear; starting with Fred Waring* and on through Bing Crosby, Martin Landau, Elvis Presley,Continue reading “Joshua Tree and Big Morongo”