Joshua Tree National Park is where the Mojave and the Colorado deserts intersect, and in my opinion, this is a highly underrated park.
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Introduction
I’ve been in the US for a little over three years now, and I’ve been incredibly fortunate to get a chance to study and eventually find a job in San Diego, California, regarded as one of the prettiest cities in the US. During the first weekend of March, 2024, my fiancé and I went on a weekend trip to Joshua Tree National Park, which is about 160 miles away, roughly a 2.5-3 hour drive from San Diego.
To tell you in a nutshell, Joshua Tree National Park (JTNP), established in 1994, is named after the iconic Joshua Tree. Joshua Tree National Park is where the Mojave and the Colorado deserts intersect, and in my opinion, this is a highly underrated park, which offers great desert-scapes, houses a variety of shrubs and trees, and is a great spot for camping and hiking on dry trails with a few unique rock formations. The park has beautiful campsites and photo spots for viewing the beautiful night-sky and astrophotography too. In fact, it is quite amusing to know that the Joshua Tree National Park and Mojave Desert also has snow in the winter.
Disclaimer:-
I have attempted to document my journey, drive and park experience in Spring 2024, but the actual experience prevalent at the park might be quite variable depending on the road conditions, weather, crowd etc. I highly recommend checking the National Park Service website for this park, for the most accurate, weather, road, access conditions if you plan to visit.
Joshua Tree is well connected by roads to both Los Angeles and San Diego. So if you’re not from Southern California, you may consider flying into LAX, SAN or even the Palm Springs Airport (PSP). The park is within driving distance from either of these places, but there is very limited public transport that ploys to towns nearby and so it is highly recommended to rent or drive your own vehicle to explore the park. There is no necessity to have a 4x4 vehicle unless you have a camping permit or reservation for a specific campsite which requires a 4x4 vehicle with increased ground clearance.
- From Los Angeles: Approximately 2-3 hours (about 130 miles) via I-10 E and CA-62 E.
- From San Diego: About 2-3 hours (around 150 miles) via I-15 N and CA-62 E
- From Palm Springs: Roughly 1 hour (about 40 miles) via CA-62 E.
To get ready for the road trip, I packed the following in my car to be equipped for most scenarios.
Road-Trip Stuff
- Tyre inflator
- Tyre puncture repair kit
- Battery Jump Start kit
- Windshield chip repair kit - proved to be very useful.
Overall Trip Packing
Since Joshua Tree is practically a desert, there are practically no fuel stations, water dispensers, shops or food stalls inside the national park, and so I’d advise carrying everything you need before you enter the national park through the entry points.
Here are some key items from my list:-
- Fruits, Biscuits, Snacks
- Packed sandwiches for lunch, if staying in the park.
- Bottled water.
- Electrolytes.
- Picnic mats
- Sunglasses
- Sunscreen
- Caps
- Wind jackets/Rain jackets
- Hiking/Running Shoes
- First-Aid Kit
With most of the items tossed into the boot, we were off to Joshua Tree!
We made this trip in my E90 328i, and I am also simultaneously drafting my ownership thread for this vehicle. It was a delight to be behind the wheel of this car, and this trip gave us a little of everything. Howling winds, crazy rain and even a sandstorm but the E90 was glued to the roads amidst all of it.
Drive Up To Joshua Tree
The drive from San Diego to Joshua Tree National Park takes about 2-3 hours depending on traffic conditions and the halts you make. The typical distance is about 160-170 miles If you’re driving from San Diego, and the i-15 N is the most popular freeway to take and you will pass along the beautiful town of Escondido and Temecula (known for wineries) which was green in early March, 2024. The entire freeway has plenty of gas stations and food opportunities. Since we had a night’s stay in Joshua Tree, we decided to make a stop at Palm Springs for lunch, before driving the last hour to Joshua Tree. Alternatively, you may also take i-15N and then move to CA-62E if you want to drive closer to the other desert regions.
Shortly after we left San Diego, it started to rain heavily, but the car held its own. I’ve noticed most of these freeways experience a lot of crosswinds which can literally push your car into different lanes depending on the wind speeds. The drive itself was fairly smooth, with just a few bad patches of roads under construction along the i-15. This was when I had a rock chip fly into the windshield along the passenger side pillar, when we were about 20 mins shy of Palm Springs, but I’ll get to this a little later.
After lunch at Palm Springs, we set the navigations for the Cottonwood Visitor Center, Pinto Valley Basin, which is essentially the South Entrance of the Park. This decision came from the fact that a heavy wind advisory was in effect over that weekend, which was expected to die down by Sunday, while the South side of the park was less windy later that afternoon.
Joshua Tree National Park has three main entrances.
- West Entrance: The west entrance is hands-down the most popular entrance which has the iconic National Park sign for the photo-lovers, and is closest to most of the drive-by attractions.
- North Entrance: This one is closer to a casino town called Twentynine Palms and is closer to the Jumbo Rocks attraction.
- South Entrance: This entrance is near Cottonwood Springs and provides access to the southern part of the park, including the Cottonwood Oasis, Lost Palms Oasis and the Cholla Cactus Gardens which is definitely worth a visit. However, this entrance is a little further east.
Depending on your schedule and weather conditions, you may choose to enter from either of these gates, but we could tell that the North and West entrances are a lot more popular.
From the South Entrance, we drove into the park, and exited from West Gate, which leads you straight into the town of Joshua Tree which was about 5 mins from our Airbnb.
The next morning, we re-entered from the North Gate this time, which is minutes away from the town of Twenty Nine Palms. and drove back onto the main loop, before exiting from the West Gate one more time. We drove back to San Diego, and were re-routed along Yucca Valley, Moronga Valley, which was quite a steep downhill patch, which finally circled back onto the i-15, just shy of Riverside. Then, the return journey was essentially similar, passing through Murrieta, Temecula, Escondido, and back into San Diego. It was nice to see snow on the San Bernardino mountains in early spring on our way back.
Continue reading about fluidicjoy's road trip for BHPian comments, insights and more information.