Day 29 - April 21 Joshua Tree Part 2, Salton Sea and Imperial Valley

Today we made the trek back to the park, the south entrance this time, about 20-30 miles. We needed to get the Jr Ranger another badge. We spent some time at the visitors center, enjoyed the ceremony, then headed back out the park. On the way out the door a snake was calling to Rosalie, so now we have added a rattle snake to the collection (stuffed and furry thank goodness)

One of the Jr Ranger tasks was to see what animals you could spot. We had missed the big horn sheep yesterday, but today one graciously  offered us a glimpse of it self so we could mark it in the book. It was on the way out so we were not able to report it to the rangers.

On the way back to Desert Hot Springs we took a back road detour. 25 miles through the most desolate country side and just two cars. Me thinks the co-pilot might have been getting concerned about the destination after the first 15 or so.

But, when we popped out we came to the Imperial Valley, Salton Sea, and crops galore. Quite a change from the desert we had just left. We had to slow down/stop to look over and talk about the lemon trees, orange trees, bell pepper plants, green beans, sweet corn, palm tree groves, and grape vines (green table grapes we think). It was interesting to see the crops in the fields. You hear so much about California's bread basket, it was interesting to see it. No, we did not stop to sample the wares. In South Dakota perhaps, but not here. Too many witnesses.

We then headed off to the Salton Sea State park for a picnic. This is a small park on the east side of the sea. We got to the visitors center just a they were closing but did manage to get to see the video that gave a history of the sea area. Seems this had been connected to Gulf of California in the more ancient times, but of late had been cut off. There was some canal building in the 20's or so that went awry. Seems the canal cuts were flooded out by a large spring runoff, the river changed course and ran directly into the Salton Sea for 16 months or so before they could reroute it to it's original course.  The Salton has no outlet so so much for lake front property... 227 feet below sea level....

Since they got the river back on course the lake/sea has been gradually shrinking, getting more saline every year, about twice the level of salt as the oceans at this time.

All in all an interesting side trip that was pretty much spur of the moment.