A Desert Oasis

In between our two boondocking visits to Joshua Tree National Park, we spent a week at an RV park near Palm Springs in the Coachella Valley. Built upon a large aquifer in the Colorado Desert, the greater Palm Springs area is a man-made oasis of golf resorts and swimming pools. And of course, has several native California fan palm oases along the faults that crisscross the area. Most RV parks are located in the town of Desert Hot Springs and offer hot spring soaking pools. We stayed at the Sky Valley Resort which was about 90% retirement/vacation homes and 10% RV parking.

The city of Palm Springs is known for its mid-century modern architecture so we spent an afternoon driving around some of the neighborhoods. One of the most famous houses is the Richard Neutra-designed Kaufmann Desert House, built for the same department store mogul as Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater House.

We visited the Sunnylands Gardens in Rancho Mirage one afternoon. Sunnylands is the historic estate of the Annenberg family and is used as a place of diplomacy and dialogue. US Presidents have hosted world leaders there since the 1960s and as recently as Obama. The gardens are free and open to the public at certain times.

The Coachella Valley Preserve was a short 10-minute drive from our RV park. One afternoon we did the short walk through the incredibly beautiful Thousand Palms Oasis. The native California fan palms are growing here because of groundwater surfacing along the San Andreas Fault.

On Saturday, we did a longer hike at the Preserve, visiting 3 separate oases. The desert portions were brutal and felt never-ending at times but the oases were worth it.

There was plenty that we didn’t get to do in the area, like to aerial tramway up to Mount San Jacinto, the Palm Springs Art Museum, and yet more fan palm oases. With the glorious winter weather, I wouldn’t be surprised if we find ourselves in Palm Springs again one day.