Monday April 28, 18.3mi/29.5km

Cut Wash (266.1/2800ft) to Bull Canyon (284.4/3810ft) (CA)

The day started off easily enough, I hiked up the rest of Cut wash to a pass, and then down Gap Wash, through a cool gap in the rocks.

Up at these higher elevations, Spring is in its prime. So many flowering bushes and cacti.

I arrived at the spot where I had cached my water and quickly found it.

I had a nice break in the shade of the plentiful bushes in the wash, though I could hear the nearby freeway. And sure enough, I hiked right underneath it a little while later.

Once I was on the other side of the I-40 freeway, I had entered the Mojave National Preserve.

After some very gradual climbing on some 4wd roads and washes, I was starting to get a pretty good view of all of the valleys to the south. After asking around, I’m pretty sure that snowy peak is Mt San Gorgonio.

The wildflowers in this wash were everywhere, and in almost every color.

For a few miles, I was on familiar terrain. The Desert Trail overlaps with the DWTH I did a couple of years ago, and this wildlife guzzler looked awfully familiar.

For an hour, I was hiking terrain I had covered before, so I didn’t have to pay attention to navigation, and could just go off of memory. Instead I paid attention to all the different plants up here at this elevation in the Mojave.

I arrived at Budweiser Spring, which was dry. I wasn’t really surprised, it was dry the last time I was here too.

After a nice lunch break in the shade of some large boulders, I started up Budweiser Canyon. It was very brushy and slow going.

And some steeper spots of granite slabs.

I was slowly gaining elevation and I kept looking behind me to gauge my progress.

Huge barrel cactus!

After an hour and a half of thrashing through brush and boulders in the wash, I finally got to leave it! By climbing up to the ridgeline…

That view is of a climb that ascends 1200 feet in half a mile. It was very steep and slow, so I forgot to take any photos. I did take this photo halfway up, as I was surprised that there was an actual tree growing.

I haven’t seen real trees on this hike since Day #1. Almost to the top….

And finally, at 5:30pm, I made it to the summit of the ridge. I loved the view to the south, seeing everything I had hiked over the past week.

And the view to the north, of the upcoming Kelso dunes.

But mostly it was so late in the day it was time to hurry up and get myself off of this mountain, and down into the next wash, where I could camp. I started off by going down an easy ridge.

And further down the ridge….

The descent wasn’t steep at all but the ridgetop was choked with Cholla cacti and other sharp plants that wanted my blood. And the “nice burro trail” that the guidebook says runs along the ridge was complete fiction. So that 3.5 miles took me over 2 hours, which meant when I was on the final descent into Bull Canyon, it was nearing 8pm and getting quite dark. Once I was in the canyon bottom, it was disappointingly a brushy and rocky wash. So I stumbled along until I found a spot that looked flat enough, and threw up my tent, and passed out. Definitely the hardest day on this trail so far!

Sunday April 27, 22.8mi/36.7km

Calumet Mine (242.1/790ft) to Cut Wash (266.1/2800ft) (CA) -1.2mi trailhead

I started off the day with many miles of flat easy walking, crossing the entire valley between two mountain ranges.

Pretty soon after sunrise some clouds formed and kept the valley nice and cool.

After a couple hours of flat and perfectly straight hiking, I came across my first object of interest, the BNSF railroad tracks.

It was actually a pretty active rail line, I could hear and see trains coming through about every 30 minutes. An hour after that, I came to old route 66.

There was zero traffic on the road, since multiple bridges are closed for repair. But it will be the route’s 100th anniversary in 2026, so Caltrans was hard at work getting the bridges fixed for the big celebration. Next I came to the wash where I had cached my water a few weeks ago, and quickly dug it up.

It’s only 18 miles to my next water cache, so I actually had extra water and had to dump a little bit. Now I was gradually hiking uphill on this cool breezy day, and the clouds really made scenery more interesting.

The guidebook says to follow an old 4wd road for a couple miles, which basically doesn’t exist anymore so I just hiked in a straight line toward the mountains.

I took a nice long break at an old mining area, which had some pretty neat looking equipment.

And also a couple frighteningly deep mineshafts that were fenced off for safety.

Hiking up the wash into the heart of the Marble Mountains was relaxing, and I no longer had to pay attention to navigation when I was just following a wash.

The guidebook has a list of plants for each section, I think these are Chinese Lanterns.

The Marble Mountains are volcanic in nature and that was becoming readily apparent from the cliffs of tuff.

The tuff also made really interesting color patterns in the washes, since the base rock is white but the gravel is reddish.

And right next to each other, I stumbled upon some very fragrant red flowers and a lucky horseshoe.

Volcanic tuff cliffs.

The cloud shadows playing with the lighting in the valley.

Towards the end of the day, I came out of the mountains and started hiking up Cut Wash, which was very wide and also full of various animal prints, including these.

Most of the hiking today was pretty easy, so when I checked my watch it was only 6pm and I had already covered 22 miles. I decided to camp here for the night, of course sheltered behind some bushes to protect from the wind.

Saturday April 26, 19.6mi/31.5km

Sheephole Tan Hill (222.5/2780ft) to Calumet Mine (242.1/790ft) (CA)

I started hiking just before 7am and finished off the little bit of uphill hiking that remained.

There was a little pass at the top, which I wouldn’t have even noticed except the guidebook mentioning it. The descent was down a rocky wash at first, which pretty quickly gave way to a nice smooth sandy wash.

After a couple hours, the wash ended and I just hiked in a straight line xc, on a surface called desert pavement.

As I progressed further north, the terrain got pretty flat and windy, and there was even some blowsand.

That soft sand was slow to walk through, so I was pleased to see the desert pavement return.

Up close:

I stopped for lunch in the shade of a large Creosote bush, which was the only shade around for miles. After lunch I had more of the soft blowsand. This area had a cool texture, pretty similar to the roof of a dog’s mouth.

In the distance I could see some clouds building.

Today I passed by 6 trashed balloons, most days I see two or three. I try to pack them out if I can easily get to them, but really the solution is to stop buying these balloons, they just become trash.

I also passed by this strange marker in the middle of the wilderness.

This section isn’t really mountainous, but it does have some very long views.

Looking North, ahead to the Marble Mountains, where I will be hiking tomorrow.

The afternoon had turned really windy, so I decided to stop and camp early, behind the last remaining hill. If I had continued hiking North, the terrain looked perfectly flat and with no vegetation, so no wind protection for my tent.

Friday April 25, 8.5mi/13.7km

Hwy 62 (214.0/1680ft) to Sheephole Tan Hill (222.5/2780ft) (CA)

I woke up at my usual 6:15am, even though I was in a hotel room. My camping sleep schedule persists even in town. I took a second bonus shower, packed my resupply food, and repaired my tent zipper with the new zipper sliders that I got from Tarptent yesterday.

I ate my first breakfast of the day in the hotel room, which consisted of microwaved Totino’s pizza rolls and a pint of Moose Tracks. Because it’s April 25th, Miss Congeniality was on TV.

I finally left the motel room just before checkout time at 11am, and went back into town to eat 2nd breakfast at a little cafe. After some internet chores, I made my way over to McDonald’s for a milkshake and to wait for my Uber to take me back to the trail. It’s a tiny town, but on Fridays and weekends there’s actually 4 Uber drivers active, and I was easily able to snag one of them. After a 35-minute drive I was back on trail.

It was almost 1pm but the weather was quite cool today so it was enjoyable walking across the sunny washes.

It was mostly easy mindless walking with lots of quiet scenery around me. I did stumble upon a fascinating surprise. a tortoise shell!

It seemed like he had been dead a long time as it was just the shell. I couldn’t figure out how the tortoise died, maybe it drowned when a flash flood came down the wash? I’m not sure how long they usually live either. There was another little shell piece nearby.

I continued up various sandy washes, gradually trending uphill all afternoon.

As I gained elevation it got windier and so I started to look for a sheltered campsite. I found a nice little spot tucked in behind some catclaw and creosote bushes in a nice soft gravelly wash.

Thursday April 24, 7.0mi/11.3km

Inner Valley of Coxcomb Mtns (207.0/2950ft) to Hwy 62 (214.0/1680ft) (CA)

I started off with a leisurely stroll downhill in the wide gravelly wash.

It was such a great campsite last night. I was surrounded by mountains up here in this alpine desert valley, and the sky was so black I could see heaps of stars. My elevated mood didn’t lessen when I turned into a wash that went slightly uphill, or even when the wash turned rocky.

After an hour I went over a mild pass, and then started descending once again, this time out of the mountains and towards the road. As usual it was rocky at first, and then smoothed out.

I arrived at highway 62, quickly unburied my cache, and then stepped over to the roadside to start hitching into town.

I even made a sign that said “hiker to town”, and tried to look presentable. There were just so few cars driving this absolutely desolate stretch of highway. Eventually at 11:30am I got a ride from a guy moving from Dallas to Palm Springs in his pickup.

So it only took me an hour and a half to get a ride, which was better than I expected but still a long time. Connor had so much stuff in his truck that I had to sit in the back, which was fine. His cute dog kept trying to lick me through the window though, I think he could sense how salty I was, ha! He dropped me off in downtown 29 Palms at the main intersection, which has a McDonald’s/ Starbucks/ Chevron. I got a quick meal at McDonald’s, picked up a package at the post office (thanks Tarptent!), and then walked over to my motel. It was a cute and very walkable little town.

The motel was very colorful…as was the motel’s owner. Very interesting guy, practicing Hindu and he insisted on explaining to me about the seven chakras. I got the key to my room, and started to sort and organize all my stuff for resupply and doing laundry.

After a shower and catching part of the movie Airplane on the TV, I walked the half mile back into dawn and did some laundry. I noticed the local newspaper has the same name as the trail that I’m hiking!

I got dinner at a Pho place, which was surprisingly good and then grabbed my finished laundry and went across the street to have a beer.

By now it was almost 8pm and starting to feel like bedtime, so I walked back to the motel, ate a pint of Ben& Jerry’s and then passed out.

Wednesday April 23, 20.6mi/33.2km

Joshua Tree NP East Bdy (186.4/1200ft) to Inner Valley of Coxcomb Mtns (207.0/2950ft) (CA)

I got an early start because I knew I had a long hot walk across the Chuckwalla Valley. I left camp a little after 6am, and 15 minutes later I was at my water cache.

As I was filling in the hole, a bunch of work trucks drove by. I think they were employees of the water department but they were eyeing me suspiciously. For the next hour I hiked along an old abandoned 4wd road.

Off to my left, I could see a huge pumping operation.

The guidebook says this is where LA pumps water up and over the mountains, what a waste of energy. The old 4wd road veered right and I left behind the hum of that operation.

Ahead of me I could see a huge solar array, easily hundreds of acres in size. It seems this whole valley is being desecrated for various industrial purposes. After hiking by the solar array and some power lines, I finally left the signs of civilization and continued North through the open desert.

It was very flat with just creosote bushes, except for this one weird ridge of red dirt.

I’m assuming those are piles of old mine tailings. The valley was also home to a healthy population of kangaroo rats, as evidenced by the honeycomb of tunnels under the ground, which would occasionally collapse when you stepped on one.

The view ahead to the Coxcomb mountains, where I would be hiking later in the day.

I crossed the national park boundary, and decided to have lunch under a shady Palo Verde tree. After lunch I hiked by this old abandoned pumping station, I think it was used for the defunct mine in the area.

I had about 2 hours of gradual uphill hiking to get into the Coxcomb mountains and it was easy walking. But I wasn’t paying much attention and accidentally impaled myself on a cactus spine. Oops.

The side of my right shoe had picked up a spine on the ground, and then on my next stride the spine had brushed my left shin and stuck. Ouch. After doing some minor first aid for a puncture wound, I eventually finished the gradual climb and then enjoyed a shady break before entering the mountains.

I followed the wash up into the coxcomb mountains, a typical strategy for getting into the interior of mountains. In this case though, this wash was blocked by massive car-sized boulders.

So I skirted them by climbing up the left bank and went around.

It was slow going, but pretty fun as it wasn’t that steep. And there were lots of cool little barrel cacti to look at.

Every once in awhile I would turn around to view my upward progress, and I had a pretty nice panorama of the valley I had just hiked across.

More climbing.

More views.

As expected, some of the rocks are loose and shift when you step on them. One of them caught me off guard and I slipped, catching some rough granite on my trip to the ground. Oops again. I had too much blood anyway.

The whole climb was 800 vertical feet in 0.8 miles, and I kept switching from the left bank to the right bank, since the progress was easier on the banks. The middle of the wash is where all the fast moving water flowed and leaves behind only the largest boulders, which are more difficult to navigate through. Once I got to the top I was surprised to see this amazing little hidden valley.

It was flat and ringed by mountains!

And had all these cool little rock formations!

Even some hoo-doo looking things.

It wasn’t quite 6pm, but this was such a beautiful spot I decided to camp here.

This is definitely my favorite campsite of the Desert Trail so far, and it will be hard to beat for the remainder of the trail!

Tuesday April 22, 19.9mi/32.0km

NW side of Eagle Mt (166.5/3420ft) to Joshua Tree NP East Bdy (186.4/1200ft) (CA)

I had my usual 7 A.M start and hiked into the rising ball of flame.

I spent an hour following the same faint 4wd road that I used yesterday, and then I hiked XC for another hour.

Also those mountains in the distance looked really enticing, I’m guessing at least one of those ranges will be on the Desert Trail. I continued hiking XC towards what the guidebook author called a “razorback” of black rocks.

All the lovely little cacti were in full bloom up here at this elevation of 3,000 ft.

When I got to a wash I stopped and had an early lunch in the shade. It was pretty hot after lunch and I took my time hiking up the gradually ascending wash, and after cresting a minor pass, I was quite relieved to be descending another wash. I think this one was actually called Big Wash.

It was pretty enjoyable and mindless hiking and I basically forgot to take photos the rest of the afternoon. Three hours later, and I was at the end of the wash and also the Joshua Tree Wilderness boundary.

I continued another mile, following a dirt road for the water pipeline.

I stopped right before the National Park boundary and setup camp. About 20 miles today!

Monday April 21, 16.8mi/27.0km

Maniobra Valley Wash (149.7/2160ft) to NW side of Eagle Mt (166.5/3420ft) (CA)

I had a nice easy morning of walking down the gravelly wash.

I saw a few of these large holes, I think they are burrows for Desert tortoises?

After a mile the wash turned off in an undesirable direction, and I hiked XC straight to the interstate.

It was pretty easy hiking through sparse vegetation, though I did come across one surprising obstacle, a can graveyard!

All the cans were the old style so I figured they were dumped in the 1960s. A little while later, and I was crossing over the interstate.

There’s nothing at this exit except for a convenience store, a cafe, and a museum. The General Patton museum is the first thing I hiked by.

I went into the convenience store to buy a massive cup of Dr Pepper, and some replacement first aid items. Afterwards, I ventured over to the cafe and relaxed in the climate controlled environment for over an hour while eating massive amounts of food and charging my electronics.

I paid my bill, refilled my water, and left the cafe before the rush of lunchtime customers. During the hike out of that little commercial complex I saw more antique tanks.

And a mile later, I was in Joshua Tree National Park!

It’s not one of the main entrances, or even an entrance that anybody really uses, since there’s no roads or parking. But it was a nice quiet hike up a sandy wash.

After an hour, the wash turned quite rocky and slow.

Eventually the bottom of the wash became choked with boulders and I had to scramble onto the hillside, where the guidebook described an “old miners trail”. I actually found traces of the old trail and managed to mostly follow it, And only a few parts were overgrown. The Ocotillos are blooming strong this spring!

Eventually that old trail dropped me back into the wash, which I had to climb back out of one more time to avoid another boulder choke. All of that scrambling and detouring was tiring and slow so when I got to the “Lost Palms Oasis” I took a nice break in the shade.

Now I was on an official National Park trail and the hiking was easy. Looking back on the Lost Palms Oasis:

The trail was really quite nice!

I strolled along for over an hour, seeing only one other dayhiker, and arrived at Cottonwood Spring. It was roped off with fences and signs prohibiting entry.

It would have been neat to go explore the little spring, but I wasn’t worried about getting water since the campground was only five minutes away. And because it’s for National Park tourists, of course it has water spigots.

As usual the campground was a confusing mix of roads, campsites and buildings. After filling my water I figured out how to leave the campground. The old 4wd road described in the book departs from behind campsite number 17, and the site’s occupants were a little confused when I hiked by!

Despite not having been a road in over 40 years it was remarkably easy to follow through the high desert. And I had great views of the setting sun on Eagle Mountain.

And a little while later, it sank below the horizon behind me.

Time to set up camp! I found a little sandy spot between some yuccas and called it a night.

Sunday April 20, 16.0mi/25.8km

Hidden Spring Canyon (133.7/730ft) to Maniobra Valley Wash (149.7/2160ft) (CA)

I slept great and then early this morning I heard a critter stirring in the bushes nearby. The sky was already light, so I figured time to get moving.

I hiked up the remainder of that wash and then climbed out onto a plateau, and then had an easy descent into another wash.

This would basically be the pattern for the whole morning, wash, plateau, and then back down to wash. Looking back toward the Salton Sea from the top of a plateau:

I descended into the next wash and took a break under a shady Palo Verde tree, and I noticed this strange metallic object residing nearby.

As I was exiting that wash, I saw this cool cactus which I hadn’t seen yet. It looked kind of like a prickly pear, except the pads were smaller and much more wrinkly.

And this ocotillo was positively blooming with leaves.

The next wash I followed for a couple of miles before exiting.

And the exit was a little spicy. When I was blocked by this dryfall, I was forced up the steep hill to the right.

And it was quite steep! The initial 100-ft climb out of the wash was slow, and I tested every step to make sure to not slip on the loose rocks. After that, the grade eased up quite a bit, but I still climbed a 1000ft in less than a mile. Once I got to the ridgeline, I definitely took a break at the top of that.

I had another hour of traversing the ridgeline to the summit of Orocopia peak.

The summit cairn with the Salton Sea in the background.

And of course the summit register inside of an ammo box.

The summit register went all the way back to 2004 and it was fun to read some of the old entries from previous Desert Trail hikers, and many more day hikers. The time flew by, and I quickly packed up and started the descent to the valley. Initially it was easy walking down a ridgeline and then dropping into a shallow wash. Eventually the wash got more carved into the bedrock, and I had some interesting rock formations to work around.

After a couple hours of descending in that wash, I thought I was done but there was one last dry fall obstacle to get around.

I had to hike up around it on the hillside to the left and drop back into the wash below. The section felt pretty typical of the Hayduke trail. There was even a little undercut section which formed a cave!

After that wash ended, I had a relaxing stroll up an abandoned 4WD road, and then another descent down a much easier wash. The wash was so easy that I got lost in thought and ended up hiking until my stomach reminded me that it was almost 7 pm! Oops. Time to camp.

Tomorrow I will cross over Interstate 10 and the little oasis of commerce there which consists of a cafe, convenience store and military museum.

Saturday April 19, 17.1mi/27.5km

Bdy of Mecca Hills Wilderness (116.8/60ft) to Hidden Spring Canyon (133.7/730ft) (CA) +0.2mi to Hidden Spring

I woke up a little later than usual from my cozy little spot, and got moving at 7:30.

I hiked an hour on the dirt road before I started to enter the Painted Canyon.

Getting deeper into it…

I had like a dozen cars pass me and when I got to the end of the road, that’s about how many I saw parked there. Apparently this is a popular dayhiking destination. Now free of the road, I hiked up the deeply incised canyon.

There was so much geology on display In the canyon and I took a ton of photos today. Like this cool black and white striped rock.

Thinking about that rock, I thought ahead to lunch when I would have a black and white cookie. My attention was quickly refocused on the task at hand as the canyon narrowed and I saw a ladder in my path.

Looking back down at the double ladder section.

As I continued to hike up the canyon the walls became shorter and less vertical, and in some cases I could see where they had recently collapsed.

I knew I was about to leave the canyon, so I decided to stop for lunch while I still had the shade of the Palo Verde trees. After lunch, it was a quick jaunt up out of the wash and onto a plateau. Looking South, I could see the Salton Sea again.

This area has been a designated Wilderness since 1994, but the old 4wd tracks still haven’t healed over. Which made them easy to follow all across the plateaus and ridgelines.

I heard a noise and then looked to the north where I saw a very strange sight. Flying over the I-10 corridor was a small plane pulling an advertising banner, much like you would see at the beach.

Except at the beach, it makes sense to advertise to the thousands of people who are there. In that part of the desert there’s basically zero people. Weird. I continued along ridgelines until I got to the high point for the day, a small 1800 ft summit. With great views in all directions, but especially of the Salton Sea.

The hike down to Box Canyon was overall pretty steep and there was a narrow portion of ridgeline, though not nearly as narrow or scary as the guidebook made it sound.

I got down to Box Canyon around 4 pm and followed the paved road for a little while before I dug up my water cache.

Cache #4 was another success! At this point I’m 131 miles into the Desert Trail and I’ve seen exactly one water source on the route…. and that was a water tap at a campground. Yup, it’s a dry trail. I packed up my water and started hiking into the Orocopia Mountains, the next section of this trail. For the first time on the Desert Trail, I was hiking on an actual constructed trail. Amazing!

It followed a few small ridges through a badlands area.

Towards the end of the trail, I could see down into Hidden Spring Canyon, which was my next destination.

After a mile of constructed trail, I joined the wash in Hidden Spring Canyon.

I thought this was a really interestingly shaped old dead tree.

I decided to investigate the side canyon that contained Hidden Springs, which was surrounded by palm trees.

It was less of a spring and more of a stagnant pool, but still it was technically water.

The sign said it was legally protected, and humans aren’t supposed to use it, as it’s reserved for local animals. I continued further up the canyon another half mile before deciding to call it a day and camp in the wash.

Not much distance today, but there sure was a lot of elevation gain! Along with the energy-sucking sandy washes, I burned a lot of calories today.