17/04: Mojave National Preserve
Category: General
Posted by: The Agnew Family
There's a lot of photos today. It was difficult to choose the photos for today's blog as we took a lot of amazing photos. We spent about 10 hours in the Mojave National Preserve which is in southeastern California between I-15 and I-40. The preserve is 1.6 million acres with natural features which include the Kelso Dunes, the Marl Mountains, the Cima Dome, volcanic formations such as Hole-in-the-Wall, Cinder Cone Lava Beds and a Joshua Tree forest. As it is spring and it has rained the desert is green and filled with flowers. We didn't see everything the park has to offer but we tried our best to see a good cross section.
The desert parks always tell you about the wildlife that is in the park and you rarely see any. Today was an exception as we saw a number of birds, including a hummingbird, lizards, jack rabbits, bugs and
Ok so cows aren't the normally classed as wildlife but these guys were cute. We saw a number of ranches in the park area and drove over a lot of cattle grates.
life if good, just sunning on a rock
The jackrabbits are really fast. We saw a least 50 of them but it was not easy to get a photo.
There were some interesting rock formations in the park.
We hiked the Rings Loop Trail along which we saw many flowers. The hike took us thru the Banshee Canyon.
Metal rings mounted in the rocks help you ascend narrow Banshee Canyon. I was wearing my backpack and almost got stuck a couple of times.
The flowers were beautiful. There were tiny little flowers poking up from the desert floor, bushes bursting with flowers, cacti showing off their brightly coloured blooms. The flowers were a multitude of colours including pink, red, yellow, white, purple, and green. Can you tell I got really excited about the flowers? These are just some of the flowers we saw any that are named are my best guess from comparing them to the brochure we received at the perserve.
Sacred datura and Threadleaf groundsel.
Cholla.
Don't know the first one but the second photo is Mojave Yucca.
Mojave Mound Cactus.
Mohave and Chemehuevi Indians from the Colorado River area created what is now known as the Mojave Road to so they conduct trade with others along the Pacific Coast. There are natural springs about 20 miles or so along the route they chose. When the white man came he also followed this route. Today it is used mostly by four wheelers.
The white line in the photo is the Mojave Road.
Rock House was built by a soldier when he returned from war after having been gased. The soldier thought we would only live a year or two but lived for 25 years here in the desrt. Rock House is near a well-known watering hole and site of an 1860s military outpost.
White Cross World War I Memorial.
A sub-species of the Joshua Trees found at Joshua Tree National Park is found in Mojave National Preserve. The trees here are shorter but denser than those found at Joshuar Tree National Park.
We saw thousands of Joshua Trees as we drove Mojave Road and Cima Road.
In the early 1900's and around WWII Kelso Depot was a thriving town.
Kelso dunes is the largest field of eolian sand deposits in the Mojave Desert. The dune field covers 45 square miles and includes migrating dunes, vegetation-stabilized dunes, sand sheets and sand ramps. As we were short on time we only hiked to the first dune.
Our shadows.
The desert primrose
The desert parks always tell you about the wildlife that is in the park and you rarely see any. Today was an exception as we saw a number of birds, including a hummingbird, lizards, jack rabbits, bugs and
Ok so cows aren't the normally classed as wildlife but these guys were cute. We saw a number of ranches in the park area and drove over a lot of cattle grates.
life if good, just sunning on a rock
The jackrabbits are really fast. We saw a least 50 of them but it was not easy to get a photo.
There were some interesting rock formations in the park.
We hiked the Rings Loop Trail along which we saw many flowers. The hike took us thru the Banshee Canyon.
Metal rings mounted in the rocks help you ascend narrow Banshee Canyon. I was wearing my backpack and almost got stuck a couple of times.
The flowers were beautiful. There were tiny little flowers poking up from the desert floor, bushes bursting with flowers, cacti showing off their brightly coloured blooms. The flowers were a multitude of colours including pink, red, yellow, white, purple, and green. Can you tell I got really excited about the flowers? These are just some of the flowers we saw any that are named are my best guess from comparing them to the brochure we received at the perserve.
Sacred datura and Threadleaf groundsel.
Cholla.
Don't know the first one but the second photo is Mojave Yucca.
Mojave Mound Cactus.
Mohave and Chemehuevi Indians from the Colorado River area created what is now known as the Mojave Road to so they conduct trade with others along the Pacific Coast. There are natural springs about 20 miles or so along the route they chose. When the white man came he also followed this route. Today it is used mostly by four wheelers.
The white line in the photo is the Mojave Road.
Rock House was built by a soldier when he returned from war after having been gased. The soldier thought we would only live a year or two but lived for 25 years here in the desrt. Rock House is near a well-known watering hole and site of an 1860s military outpost.
White Cross World War I Memorial.
A sub-species of the Joshua Trees found at Joshua Tree National Park is found in Mojave National Preserve. The trees here are shorter but denser than those found at Joshuar Tree National Park.
We saw thousands of Joshua Trees as we drove Mojave Road and Cima Road.
In the early 1900's and around WWII Kelso Depot was a thriving town.
Kelso dunes is the largest field of eolian sand deposits in the Mojave Desert. The dune field covers 45 square miles and includes migrating dunes, vegetation-stabilized dunes, sand sheets and sand ramps. As we were short on time we only hiked to the first dune.
Our shadows.
The desert primrose