Ladder Canyon

On our long and ever growing list of places we want to go and trails we want to explore has been a place called Ladder Canyon.  We read about it several years ago and finally made it out there a few weeks ago.  It's a couple of hours from where we live and just south of the small desert town of Mecca or close to an hour southeast of Palm Springs in Southern California.

It's in an area called Painted Hills.  The soil colors are varied and pretty.

We followed the directions in our hiking book, out some dirt roads to a parking area.  We were surprised at how many cars were there.  This trail was a lot more popular than we had expected!  It was a chilly day but beautiful and sunny.  The start of the trail was up a wash...

After a short hike, we watched for the side canyon described in our hiking book and hiked up to the start of Ladder Canyon.  It was awesome right from the start!  This is a spot right at the top of the first little climb.  The canyon is narrow, winding, and a bit dark...

Look....a ray of sun!...

Looking up!

The trail is named Ladder Canyon because of the ladders people have brought up to climb the steep sections of the canyon.  Here's the first one...

The trail winds around through a slot canyon that's been carved from water.  Here's a spot where we climbed up above an earlier section and could look back down inside.  That's my hubby in there...

Water carved this great place and continues to do so.  Therefore, ladders sometimes get washed away and sometimes they just need to be replaced from old age.  Here's an old one...

Here's the brand new one that replaced it...

Some places are steep but don't need a ladder...

 This is my daughter climbing the last ladder out of Ladder Canyon...

A short hike took us to the top and spectacular views!

There was a series of rock piles at the top.  Each one was bigger than the last.  It was art-like and pretty cool.  We all added a rock to each pile.  It seemed like the thing to do.  

The views were amazing!  That bit of water in the center of the photo is a peek at Salton Sea...one of the world's largest inland seas.

We were surrounded by badlands.

From the top, we could look down into the canyons we had just hiked in...

Onward and upward!  We followed arrows made of rocks to go up the final hill and back down into the main wash to hike back to our car.  There were several of these arrows to point the way...

Up, up, up!

As we hiked along, we were amazed at how so much of the plant life is dead and shriveled up.  I've lived in Southern California and explored it's deserts all my life and have never seen them so dry and crispy.  Evidence of how severe our drought really is.  We first noticed how bad it is last September when we came back from our trip to Arizona and Utah.  Their deserts there were lush, green, and colorful.  But, as we entered the eastern part of California and the Mojave desert it was almost all brown and black.  The cactus, small plants, bushes and trees that are normally green (at least a little) were brown and black.  It was sad to see.  But, I know that it can all come back if we get enough rain.

Here are some examples of what's happened to the plant life that would normally be green...

Thousands and thousands of cactus were not only dead, they were dried up with only skeletons remaining.

Most of the cactus that wasn't dead was shriveling up and falling apart.

Cholla cactus usually have brown bottoms but the tops are usually green with fresh white needles.  Most of the ones we saw that day were dried up and crumbling.

As we hiked back down into the main canyon there were some plants that were green because those areas get more water from run off and the river that occasionally flows through from flash floods.

Look!  My daughter found a heart shaped rock!

There were just a couple of ladders on the way down.  Here's the last one...

On our way through the main canyon, we came upon a section with white rock...

Then, we turned a corner and there was so much of it that it looked like snow!

 The moon!

 Slot canyons are fun to explore but here's a reminder that it can be a very dangerous place to be!  I sure wouldn't want to be anywhere close by when big rocks like this fall!

Beautiful and peaceful.

The afternoon sun and bits of green and Fall-like colors in the main canyon were pretty!

The brilliant gold of this tiny tree on the side of the cliff and the sun shining through it created a breathtaking splash of color.

We had a lot of fun exploring Ladder Canyon.  And, no matter how much we explore the desert, we're constantly amazed at how much there is to see and do in these seemingly empty places.

We were also surprised on this trip to see so much agriculture in the desert! 

We saw peppers, citrus groves, and grape vineyards

And, of course, the famous date groves.  Here's one on the side of a highway.  These trees were much shorter than most of the groves.  It made me wonder how many varieties of dates there are.  So, I looked it up.  I couldn't find a definite answer but it looks like there are at least a couple dozen kinds.

The sunset on the way home was pretty!  I tried to capture it in a photo but it was quite challenging in a moving car, with hills, trees, and trucks getting in the way.  But, here's a blurry one to give you an idea of what we saw...

We capped our day off with a dinner from the famous In-N-Out and a refreshing beer!

Such a fun day!

Jackpot

What an awesome adventure we had last Sunday!

We drove out to the Borrego desert in northern San Diego County for a hike.

We set out to hike to a Calcite mine.  We parked in a turn out area on the side of the road

 and hiked down into a wash and up, up, up into the hills.

This mine has an interesting history.  It was active during World War II.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, the government mined calcite for bomb sights and anti-warcraft weaponry.  The calcite mined here was high quality.  When someone would view through it, there would be a series of colored rings.  When the center ring was held on a target, the person's head could move from side to side but the center ring would remain on the target.  Interesting!

There were areas that were covered in leftover bits of calcite crystals.

Most were cloudy but some of them were clear like glass.

Here's a vein of it in a wall of rock...

It wasn't a typical type of mine with a hole in the ground leading deep into the earth.

This mine is slits in the rock.  They look like someone used a giant knife to carve out slices of earth. The slits we saw were usually about four feet wide and 20 feet long.

The terrain was fascinating and ever changing.  There were huge sandstone rocks with holes and interesting patterns.  This one is probably three stories tall or maybe even bigger...

This was on top of a big hill that we climbed.  It was much harder than most of the rock and ground we'd walked on that day.  What an interesting texture.  I'm curious as to how it was formed.

There were some interesting plants on the top.  

They had silvery, white stems and were just starting to sprout leaves for spring.

The view from the top was amazing.  We could see a lot of the Borrego area.  

And, to the east and southeast, we could see the great Salton Sea.

It's amazing to see so much water in the desert.  But, what we see now is only a small amount compared to the past.  The whole area used to be under the ocean.  And, just decades ago, this lake was huge.

Another interesting thing we saw that day were these odd formations in the sandstone...

Here's one that was loose from the sandstone walls.  They were sitting all around

 in one area we walked through.  They were hard like cement and very heavy.

We were lucky to see this colorful lizard along the way.  He was over a foot long.

The mines and views were interesting and fun to see.  But, the best part of our day was about to come.

As we headed back down the mountain, we took a turn toward a slot canyon we'd

read about in our hiking guide book.  This is how it looked as we started to hike in...

It got narrower...

When we came upon this part it was so exciting...

It was very narrow and so smooth from all the water that has rushed through to form it.

And, the walls became very tall.  There were obstacles to climb up...

Some of the obstacles took some creative thinking to figure out how to get up and over.

And, sometimes down...

This is by far the most awesome slot canyon we've found in this area.

Spectacular!

Sometimes the bottom was too narrow to walk.

So, sometimes, one foot on each side wall of the canyon was the best way to go through.

The grippy sandstone was very helpful!

This one took the most thought and multiple tries to find a way down.

We first tried straddling it by sitting on one side, feet on the other, and alternating weight to move over and down.  The canyon floor just beyond where I was sitting was six to eight feet feet down.

We eventually figured out a way down.

Sometimes, one shoe barely fit in the bottom...

Going back down was different but just as tricky...

Wow!  That was SO much fun!

After the slot canyon, we still had a lot of hiking to do to get back to the car.

And, there were still amazing things to see.  Like this giant piece of sandstone that had fallen from the wall.  It may look small but it's larger than a car...

Here's another area with fallen sandstone.  It may look like a small jumble but

the larger pieces are probably close to the size of our living room...probably much larger.

This huge tour vehicle passed us on the way back. 

I can't help but think of all the wonderful things they miss by touring the area in a vehicle.

I know they saw some wonderful things but I think they missed the very best parts.

Not to mention, a great workout!

We hiked four hours and our GPS said we hiked over six miles.

That included a LOT of hills.  We were very tired when we were done.

And, we were quite sore the next day.  But, it was SO worth it.  What a blast!

We love being out in nature.  And, we love hiking.  Great finds and adventures like this

are such a bonus.  I joked with hubby about how slot canyons are the kind of slots I like to play

and that we hit the jackpot that day!  Woo hoo!

Be sure to click on one of the pictures to view them large
 and get a better idea of the scale and fun we had.