After arriving back in Los Angeles from Newark, I gave myself a day of rest, then set out on another trip to the Coachella Valley. My previous visit to the Palm Springs area was great, and the hike I did at the Indian Canyons is still my favorite hike so far, so I figured it would be a nice weekend trip to head back there again.
The weather was pretty warm in California, which was a jarring difference from the New Jersey cold. The hike I selected, the Moon Country Loop via McCallum Trail, had relatively low shade in the latter part of the hike, so that also made the sun feel particularly hot.
The parking situation was a bit strange here—there was an open area that looked like it was designed to be a parking lot, but the gate leading to that area was closed, so people ended up all parking on the side of Thousand Palms Canyon Road. Because it’s a Saturday, there were a lot of people out hiking, so I had to park a decent distance out from the trailhead.
The beginning of the trail was very tourist-friendly, with wooden bridges built over wet parts and clearly-marked dirt trails with plenty of shade.
I followed the McCallum Trail up to Simone Pond, which had remarkably clear water. A handful of people who ventured out here were having a picnic next to the water, and there also appeared to be a ranger answering tourist questions about the area.
After doing a loop around the pond, I transferred over to Moon Country and headed out into the barren desert. The first area of interest was a vista point where I was able to see an unobstructed view of the Coachella Valley Preserve. In the first photo below, you can see the palm trees surrounding Simone Pond, while the second photo shows the vegetation surrounding the McCallum Trailhead.
I continued past the vista point and hiked a fairly large circle around the desert, and was met with a zig-zagging path up a mountain, but I figured that I didn’t have enough food and water with me to continue up, and it was getting a bit too hot, so I turned around and followed the dried wash back to the trailhead.
This hike wasn’t quite as amazing as Murray Canyon, but it’s always fun seeing desert oases. There’s another hiking trail going southeast instead of northwest from the same general trailhead area that leads to Pushawalla Palms; I look forward to checking that off my hiking list as well, the next time I’m in the Coachella Valley visiting.
Here are some more below-the-fold photos from my hike:
