With a half day to show a visiting Kiwi student a taste of something different, Joshua Tree was an obvious choice. A short drive from my new home, the granite slickrock and boulder piles are a world apart from the terrain on offer in NZ. Given the limited time I thought a taste of the northern outskirts of the Wonderland of Rocks would be a good approach. I wanted to have a closer look at the slot canyon and talus caves in Rattlesnake Creek than I was allowed on my last visit and figured it would add some interest and variety to a hike. We drove up the long bajada to Indian Cove. It was already a comfortable mid-morning temperature by the time we arrived at the trailhead despite being full-winter. We hiked up the wash, over and past flash flood polished megacrystic K-spar granitic rocks, quickly overtaking a couple less familiar with rock scrambling. We poked around the bottom of the slot canyon where I was surprised to find all the potholes full of water and frogs happily swimming and croaking. Some large slickrock slabs took us up and over to the head of the slot canyon. Although technically a technical canyon with 2-3 rappels and some beautiful sculpted water-features, it held little curiosity or lasting appeal to me since I could see the entire was only a stone or two's throw in length.
Continuing on up the wash we turned the corner, losing the long views back down the bajada. As footsteps and trash diminished and boulders engulfed us, it finally felt like we were getting somewhere. Soon we came to the main tributary of Rattlesnake Creek where a complex pile of large boulders covers a bedrock canyon to create a talus cave. We did our best to follow the bottom of the talus cave but occasionally needed to climb up to a higher level to carry on. Overall the cave was more continuous than I was expecting and we needed to use a flashlight to get through the darkest section. The smooth water polished rock created some interesting play of light as light reflected its way into some of the cave's chambers.
After a while the cave became shallower, less complex and more open which seemed like a good point to climb back out. Back on the surface we found ourselves surrounded by large rocks with hints of real wilderness. We continued up the drainage and picked a nearby hill to try to climb that would hopefully afford us a view and a lunch stop. After a tricky and exposed slab climb, we rolled over into the top of the hill. We enjoyed the many shapes and patterns and rock formations here at the edge of Wonderland as we ate lunch (frontispiece).
The walk back was uneventful. Certainly much faster heading downhill and overland this time, but not without its route-finding challenges. With a little time to spare we drove on through the park to give some more glimpses of desert diversity and then stopped at a real palm oasis right on an active strand of the San Andreas Fault.
Thanks to Sara and Genevieve for a pleasant day out.
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