Joshua Tree

Joshua Tree was otherworldly. That's the best way to describe it. The landscape and vegetation are so unique; I've never seen anything like it. I think the best part of Joshua Tree was the scrambling. There are these huge piles of rocks everywhere, and you can just get out of your car and start climbing on them.

(Nina and Stephanie on top of several rock piles.)

The girls found a tree to climb, too.

We took a nice hike around Hidden Valley. It's almost entirely enclosed by these rock formations. Rustlers used to hide their stolen cattle there.

The next stop was Keys Point, from which you could look down on Coachella Valley and see the San Andreas fault. It's that thing that looks like a snake running through the middle of the valley. I just kept thinking, why why why would anyone intentionally live there? You could see several towns in the valley right by the fault. The other thing that was disturbing was the smog, which is obvious in this picture.

When you looked to the left, you could see this giant salt lake (forgot what it's called), and the mountains beyond it are in Mexico.

It was super duper windy on top of Keys Point.

Stephanie and I pretended a giant earthquake was happening.

Driving through the park we stopped and saw a forest of these crazy looking cholla plants.

Our last stop of the day was Cottonwood Springs.

You could hike to an oasis or to the top of Mastadon Peak. We chose Mastadon Peak, thinking it was the shorter hike. Unfortunately, we don't know how to read a map, so it was longer and more difficult than we thought, but oh so rewarding when we got to the top.

The day ended with me injuring myself on the way down the mountain. I was wearing sneakers that aren't good for hiking, but they're the best I have. There were stone steps, and my feet slipped out from under me and I landed on my back. My back went right on the pointy rock; you can see exactly where I hit by looking at the bruise on my back. It was bad enough that I couldn't get up right away. Nina had to help me. It even hurt to breathe. I didn't want to be a baby about it, but I knew I wouldn't be able to teach the next day without something stronger than ibuprofen, so I decided to stop at urgent care. That's when it turned into a big ordeal. The doctor at urgent care thought I may have broken ribs, but she didn't have x-rays there, so she sent me to the ER. I went to the ER by my house, where once again, the doctor and nurses were wonderful. The nurse walked in and was like, "Jill?"

"No," I replied, "I'm Erin."

"Yes," she said, "but didn't you have a run-in with a hill?" She was this super sweet old lady who gave me Percocet. I had x-rays that showed I hadn't broken anything, but the whole process took a while, and then I had to go to the pharmacy. I didn't get home till after midnight, so I knew there was no way I'd make it to work today, especially since everyone kept warning me I'd be in a lot of pain this morning. It was a really bad day to miss work, but oh well. It's not like I fell on purpose. I have to admit, I was kinda hoping my ribs were broken. It's always nice to have your pain validated by knowing that you really are seriously injured. And it'd be kind of badass to say I had broken ribs.

Anyway, it was a lovely day. We were on a tight schedule, which kinda sucked, but I felt like we saw everything we needed to see. Oh, and I forgot to mention that I had the best muffin of my life for breakfast at the Natural Sisters Cafe- chocolate coconut. I can't wait to take my parents there in March!