Well, kind of.

We attempted to depart Portland early Christmas morning, but the guy who ran the jet bridge into our plane had other plans. After a two hour delay, our flight was cancelled. We were rerouted to San Francisco and an eight hour layover. We finally arrived at our hotel at 11pm as opposed to 11am. Alaska made it somewhat alright by refunding most of our airfare, but is 24 hours of our time worth that? And half a day at our too expensive hotel (we splurged this trip for reasons evident in the photos below)? ?‍♂️

Our first day involved 2″ of rain, flooding, and getting to know town. We did a bunch of walking, some grocery shopping, and enjoyed light sightseeing with Ruddy’s General Store Museum, the Palm Springs Historical Society next door, and finished up at the Palm Springs Art Museum. I’d recommend all of these things even on a sunny day. Figure 15 minutes, 30 minutes, and 1.5 hours, respectively. The rain, which apparently they receive three times a year (our luck on this trip!) was nuts. At times we contemplated calling a Lyft just to cross the street. We finished the night with an absolutely fantastic dinner at Workshop, an easy Top 5 meal.

The second day was getting to it. What’s “it”? Our vacation usual! EXERCISE. I pieced together a couple of local trails connected by a road or two. Lyft to the trailhead, hike the South and North Lykken trails, and walk back through town. The hikes combined for about eight miles and were fairly easy going aside from a bad route on the most northern end that involved a good bit of scrambling to finish in someone’s backyard. I’d highly recommend the southern section if you’re visiting. The North can be skipped, but if you do it maybe take the Museum Trail? These hikes are highly exposed until sunset so lots of sunscreen and water in the warmer months.

The second day we hopped in our rental car and made it out to Joshua Tree. We arrived at the main gate right at opening, which involved no wait. I think a lot of folks stayed home (local visitors) due to the weather reports. What had been heavy rains in Palm Springs was over a foot of snow on the western half of Joshua Tree, which is the high elevation and more scenic section. While we had planned to get a solid hike in again this day, the first ten feet of our first scenic foray (a quick .5mi trail) made it clear this was not a day for hiking; solid ice everywhere (bail!). We did make our way around the Barker Dam and Arch Rock Trails, but it was rather precarious and probably unwise. Heading east and leaving elevation, we came into a Mars-scape that is the other half of the park. Maybe we could hike down here? … And then minutes ahead of us a car crossed the centerline, ran head-on into another causing that one to flip. We sat on the road and ate lunch for two hours. With the sun setting, we called it a day. Joshua Tree was pretty amazing and had some incredibly unique flora and rock formations, but I couldn’t see more than a day there and am not sure I need to go back.

Having only gotten a couple of miles hiking in at Joshua Tree, day three needed some. The Araby-Berns Loop was another highly rated trail accessible from town and it didn’t disappoint. The trail was very well maintained, had great flow, provided the best views of the Bob Hope House, and even escaped into the wilderness (read: no city view) for a good bit. If you’re doing only one hike in town, make this it.

Our final day was spent strolling through town, checking out gift and antique shops, and the Moorten Botanical Garden, which had some incredible cacti.

I didn’t know what to expect of Palm Springs and quite frankly had never even thought of visiting, but was pleasantly surprised. The old-school Hollywood vibe still exists, everyone was incredibly friendly (we did a lot of running and walking through neighborhoods and got “Hellos” from everyone plus a conversation or two). The winter weather is to die for. So nice I said a few times “I could live here,” would look at summer temperatures (regularly over 110 degrees) and reconsider.

We stayed at the Villa Royale based on a friend’s recommendation (get a room with a fireplace!!), Lyft’d or walked everywhere, and rented a car for the sole day in Joshua Tree. I’d recommend all of this. It’s also really hard to go wrong with food. We enjoyed a lot of what we had, but my only hard recommendation is linked above (Workshop).