Last week I went on vacation with my family to Palm Springs, California. Palm Springs is basically a desert where people decided to build houses and golf courses. With over 100 golf courses, it has more than any other city in the country. Here are some pictures from places I went during the week.
The Living Desert
The Living Desert is pretty much a desert zoo. It has some some neat animals and plants, most specific to the desert (go figure.)
Palm Springs Aerial Tramway
My family took the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway to the top of Mount San Jacinto, which is a state park. There were some great views of Palm Springs from the tramway, and some beautiful scenery once we got to the top. Also interesting, the temperature at the summit of Mount San Jacinto (at around 60 degrees) was 40 degrees cooler then at the base (where it was about 100 degrees that day.)
Joshua Tree National Park
Last Tuesday we met up with my dad’s cousin to go to Joshua Tree National Park. Joshua trees are a mix between a tree and a cactus. Truthfully, I wasn’t terribly impressed by the Joshua trees, but it was nice to spend time with my cousin (once removed) who I haven’t seen in a while.
Rosarito, Mexico
We took a 4 hour bus tour trip to Rosarito, Mexico, which is about 20 miles south of the Mexican-US border. It was neat to visit Mexico and nice to walk on the beach, but it was sad to see the poverty-stricken people living there. As you walk down the streets they would practically beg you to purchase some of their merchandise.
My Cousin’s House + Golf Cart
Near the end of the week we visited my dad’s cousin in her exclusive golf course retirement community where you have to be over 55 years old to live. Even though she doesn’t golf, my aunt has a nice golf cart to travel within the community. It was nice to spend some more time with her and visit her house. Driving her golf cart was especially fun.
The trip to Palm Springs with my family was very enjoyable. Palm Springs is an interesting city with unique sights. However, even though it has 360 sunny days a year, I don’t think think that I could handle the 100-125 degree temperatures during the summer.
Heading anywhere for vacation this summer?
Glad to see you had a good trip. I felt like I was there receiving your Twitter updates, so I basically already went on a vacation.
said Justin Cady at 11:50 am on Saturday, June 14
Your trip sounds fun. I’m glad you enjoyed it. I went to Florida a couple weeks ago and I’m going to San Fransisco in July. California is pretty sweet. You look hard in that hat too.
said Luke at 1:40 pm on Saturday, June 14
your pics were sweet. i just got back from italy about 2 hours ago. it was also sweet.
said mark at 8:16 pm on Tuesday, June 17
do you own that hat still? if so, you must prove it to me at some point this summer.
said aj at 11:30 am on Wednesday, June 18
Unfortunately, the hat belongs to my aunt. It did well protecting me from the hot California sun, though, which was very nice.
said Nathaniel Buck at 12:05 pm on Wednesday, June 18