desert – Snapping The Globe

Camels and the Capital

After an eventful day visiting the Saloum Delta in Senegal, we were still yearning to explore more than we had ever experienced in this beautiful African country.

Our friend and tour guide Mass gave us another option…one he had described to me in the past. A place that he said he wanted to take me to show me the contrasting beauty that existed in the northwest coast of the country.

It would be a long day…longer than the day spent visiting the Saloum Delta, but we were ready to tackle it for the adventures that lay in store.

*Sights along the way to the Lompoul Desert*

Three and a half hours after our early departure, we woke from our napping to realize that we had turned onto a small, hilly road, leading to the Ecolodge de Lompoul. This lodge is situated in in the Lompoul Desert, a small desert with distinctive orange sands piled into high, extraordinarily shaped dunes. Located about 145 kilometers south of Saint-Louis, the country’s former capital, the area is stunningly beautiful and offers accommodations in the form of tented lodges. As we pulled into the Ecolodge’s perimeter, we noticed the row of tents to the left and the main tent containing the restaurant on the right side.

The main thing we saw, however, was the magnificent sand dunes that stretched out beyond the tents, all the way to the Atlantic Ocean!

While the lodge offers quad bikes to rent and ride throughout the desert (which would have been fun), we had opted to do a more traditional activity…riding camels!

We jumped onto our camels and headed out into the barren landscape. It was hot but a faint breeze, from the nearby ocean, cooled the air as we plodded on through the desert. It was quite beautiful and serene. While we wished that we would have had time to ride all the way to the water, it was still quite some distance. Instead, we concentrated on the shifting sands and even spotted a dung beetle!

With our ride over, we headed back to the camp to have a cool drink before hitting the road again. One thing we wanted to do before we left, however, was check out the accommodations. Peeking into the first tent, we discovered a pretty nice setup. There were beds on the left, protected with mosquito netting and the floor covered with a nice carpet. A couple of chairs and a table filled the remaining space. Behind the table, to the right, there was a dividing cloth and behind it, a basin and primitive shower and a toilet. While the tents have running water, they do not have electricity. They were extremely clean and we were impressed! Had we known the setup, we might have decided to come here the day before and spend the night!

Finally, we were on our way again, this time enroute to Saint-Louis or Ndar, as it is known to the locals. Saint-Louis was the capital of the French colony of Senegal from 1673 until 1902. From 1920 until 1957, it served as the capital of the neighboring colony of Mauritania.

*Sights between Lompoul and Saint Louis*

Driving into the city, we marveled at the colonial architecture and as we crossed the iron Faidherbe Bridge, which links the island of the city of Saint-Louis to the African mainland and we were excited to realize that we were getting ready to see life in the city. But first, lunch!

Lunch at Flamingo Restaurant was delicious and our appetites were filled with not only the grilled gambas, but with the outstanding view of the muddy Senegal River rushing under the Faidherbe bridge and the faint landscape of Mauritania in the distance. With our lunch complete, we walked outside and jumped into a horse drawn cart for the real treat! A tour of the island!

Riding through the streets, I remembered thinking of how much it reminded me of my trip to Cuba. Buildings were largely in disrepair, but I could still the beauty that once was.

Once an important economic center, it still has some important industries including fishing and tourism, mainly due to its status as a UNESCO world Heritage site. While sugar production plays an important part of their commerce, we could see how fishing is what is the most dominant.

As we crossed from the island of Saint-Louis onto the Langue de Barbarie Peninsula, this was where the role fishing plays in the community was most apparent. The village of Guet N’Dar was bustling with activity and colorful boats lined the river banks. Multihued clothing and fishing nets, attached to lines strung between buildings, fluttered in the sea breeze, while strings of bobbers littered the grounds. Near the end of the peninsula, trucks were lined readied for loading of the day’s catch.

Elsewhere, goats languished in the sun while older residents sought out shade from the afternoon’s heat. The children played in the streets, sometimes oblivious to our presence and at others captivated, running alongside our cart, yelling ”Toubab” (white people)!

As I sat on my perch, riding through the streets, I could not help but be mesmerized by its simplistic beauty but I also felt as though we were intruding on these people’s daily lives. True, they rely on tourism, yet you could feel their watchful eyes, wondering why we were truly there.

Eventually, we returned to Saint-Louis where we stopped for a moment to admire L’eglise Saint-Louis-en-I’lle, the 18th century Catholic Church which bears the distinction of being the oldest church in West Africa. The first foundation stone was laid on February 11, 1827 and was brought to fruition by Anne-Marie Javouhey, founder of the Order of Sisters of St. Joseph of Cluny and Captain Roger Baron. The stone was blessed by the apostolic prefect Girardon father and opened to it faithful on November 4, 1828.

With so much to see and experience in Saint-Louis, I could have stayed for days soaking it all in, but alas, there was a long drive back to Dakar to think of.

Bidding our adieus, we took our tired, sweaty and camel-smelling bodies to the waiting van for our return trip. Indeed it was an amazing adventure, one that I will build upon on a future trip! A night in a desert tent will definitely be something in my future when I return, but as of this day, I will think back fondly of our trip to the north of Senegal to the vast desert, the former capital and its people.

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The Motherland Experience

http://themotherlandexperiencetraveltours.com
Telephone: +221 77 295 24 24
Owner: Mass Kane
Email: Kanemass@hotmail.com

Lompoul Eco-Lodge

Restaurant Le Flamingo

https://www.hoteldelapostesaintlouis.com/le-flamingo/
Hours: 1200 noon-0200

Wondrous Windmills

While driving along Interstate 10, through the San Gorgonio Mountain Pass in the San Bernadino Mountains, you can’t miss the white giants.

The windmills.

While I was not interested in doing a formal tour, of which many different ones are offered, I did want to see these colossal turbines from a little closer perspective.

First encountering the windmills while driving along Indian Canyon Drive and heading to Joshua Tree National Park, I marveled at their size and stark contrast to the barren desert landscape. Since I did not have the time to stop and photograph the rows of white windmills at the time, I vowed to find a place to pull-off of the road on my way back and again, the next morning, for varying looks and lighting.

The Palm Springs wind farm was opened in 1982 and was destined to harness the natural wind from the San Gorgonio Pass, the gap between Southern California’s two highest mountains, a natural wind tunnel. Winds here have reached 80 miles per hour and generate enough power for 300,000 homes in Palm Springs and the Coachella Valley.

The windmills were installed at a cost of $300,000 each and are two-bladed turbines that require wind speeds of at least 13 miles per hour. They stand 328 feet tall and their blades are as long as half of an American football field (150 feet)!

As I had vowed, upon my return to Palm Springs that afternoon, I pulled onto a side road and captured an amazing photo with the sun slinking down behind the mountains. It was a spectacular sight!

The next morning, with the bright early sun aiming from the opposite direction as the previous day, I realized the opportunity for contrastive photographs. While traveling on Indian Canyon Road, just before Interstate 10, I spotted a sandy road with a sign directing travelers to the Amtrak Station. An empty parking lot gave me ample opportunity to gaze out at these skyward reaching towers adjacent to the station.

A short distance past the interstate, there were numerous side roads upon which I was able to pull my car onto and take more photographs. Although I wasn’t able to get extremely close, learn about the area’s geology, the development, design and evolution of wind turbines or see some of the older models or some of the windmill tops on the ground in the equipment yard as you would during one of the formal tours, I think that the drive through many of the back roads gave me the photo opportunities that I was seeking. There’s always Google for everything else, right?

While I enjoyed these spectacular views, they seemed quite familiar. I knew that I had seen countless older-styled windmills in the Netherlands and occasionally new ones such as these, but I had seen these particular ones and this landscape somewhere else.

Mission Impossible 3, with Tom Cruise was shot in this area. Remember the helicopter chase?

Go chase’em on your own or with a tour! Worth seeing!

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Palm Springs Wind Farms

https://www.palmsprings.com/attractions/windmills/
Address: Adjacent to Highway 111 and the I-10 Freeway just northwest of Palm Springs.
Hours: 24 hours, daily
Admission: free. Tours available with various operators for assorted prices.

Short End of the…Tree

When planning my trip to Palm Springs, I was rattling off a list of some of the places and attractions that I had hoped to visit.

While I am pretty adept at discovering everything there is to see and do in a city, I had missed one.

Joshua Tree National Park.

It was my middle son who mentioned that I should venture out into the desert to see this national treasure.

Elevated to National Park status in 1994, Joshua Tree is located one hour east of Palm Springs and approximately three hours from San Diego, Los Angeles and Phoenix…very easy to get to one of the park’s three entrances from any of these cities.

About a year ago, I had visited the Badlands National Park. It was one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had with each part of the park offering something totally different and I expected the same thing from Joshua Tree.

Dating back to 1936, when Minerva Hoyt, a Pasadena resident tirelessly worked to protect the cacti and other plants of the area, 825,000 acres were set aside as the Joshua Tree National Monument. With its large population of Joshua trees…the tree that mid-19th century Mormons believed to look like the biblical figure Joshua with his outstretched arms (tree’s limbs) guiding them westward…visitors are reminded through exhibits within its Visitor Centers of the role it played in helping homesteaders succeed in building and establishing their new lands. Well paved roads, scenic overlooks and well-maintained trails attract those near and far…Joshua Tree National Park brings in over two million visitors from all over the world each year.

*Joshua Tree National Park Visitor Center*

While of course, I expected to see a LOT of Joshua Trees…I wasn’t sure what else I might see.

Probably desert.

Probably rocks.

Probably trails.

Yes, they were all there. But as beautiful as the scenery was, I expected a little more.

Okay, you can hate me for that. But…I kept remembering the Badlands with its spires, its rainbow colored hills, its bison herds, Prairie Dog town, thousands of valley overlooks.

There is no doubt that I thought it a stunning and diverse place and I enjoyed the few hours we spent there. And…maybe that was the problem. We only spent about four hours in total driving through the park, as my travel companions had to be back in Palm Springs for an event later in the day. We made the most of our time in the park, examining the exhibits at the Joshua Tree Visitor Center near the West Entrance, climbing the rocks at Hidden Valley, gazing out of the Coachella Valley from Keys View, a little hiking at the Hall of Horrors and a longer hike to Skull Rock from Jumbo Rocks campground before exiting at the North Entrance near Twenty Nine Palms…all while constantly keeping an eye on our progress through the park and on our watches.

*Our first views of Joshua Tree National Park after the West Entrance Station.*

Those four hours paled in comparison to my entire day in the Badlands. There, I was one of a handful in the park due to it being extremely cold that winter day and I was alone in my car. Don’t ever discount being alone in a National Park! While I chose to not do any lengthy hikes because I was solo, I did do some short ones and I stopped whenever and wherever I felt like it to take thousands of photos! There was nothing keeping me from returning to Rapid City except the darkness at the end of the day.

SO…would I go back to Joshua Tree? Yes, absolutely! But this time with much more time to explore! It is a great place to enjoy hiking, camping and the great outdoors. It’s perfect for solo adventurers, groups and even for families! Much like us, children will love spotting formations in the rocks that looks like other things.

*Yep…I won’t highlight this one. Definitely not for children!*

I feel a little like I got the short end of the stick…er…tree.

Next time, I want to have sufficient time to truly experience this natural wonder, see some of the historical places in the park like the Kellogg House and Keys Ranch, hike to the Wall Street Mill and Desert Queen Mine and go back to see the fascinating Skull Rock…but this time, do it the easy way…park along the road and walk the few feet to the rock! Next time, I want to stay in the Yucca Valley so that I would be near the entrances for an early start. Next time I want to visit the Cholla Cactus Garden!

Next time!

Next time…more time!!!

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Joshua Tree National Park

https://www.nps.gov/jotr
Address: 74485 National Park Drive, Twentynine Palms, California 92277-3597
Hours: 24 hours, daily
Admission: Single, non-commercial vehicles, $30 (7-day permit). Motorcycles, $25 (7-day permit). Individual on foot or bike, $15 (7-day permit). Joshua Tree National Park Annual Pass, $55, valid for 12 months from the month of purchase and covers the entrance fee for the signee and accompanying passengers entering in a single, non-commercial vehicle. Can be purchased at park entrance stations and visitor centers.

The Wild, Wild West

Saturday afternoons were for westerns.

Bonanza (1959 to 1973), Gunsmoke (1955-1975) and Rawhide (1959-1966), were some of my favorites. They were preceded by countless of other popular movies and series, set during a time where cowboys, Indians, outlaws and sheriffs ruled the land.

When Hollywood began searching for a “living, breathing movie set”, 32,000 acres in the California desert near Palm Springs was deemed the perfect location. Investors, including Roy Rogers, Dale Evans, Dick Curtis and Bud Abbott, incorporated the land which became known as Pioneertown.

The town, easily accessible from Los Angeles, served as a filming location, vacation destination and residence for those working in the entertainment industry. The structures built on Mane Street were fully functional and included a grocery store, saloon, restaurant, motel, beauty shop, bowling center and shooting gallery. More than fifty films and serials were filmed in Pioneertown during the 1940s and 1950s, including the popular Gene Autry Show, the Cisco Kid television series (1950-1956), Annie Oakley television series (1954-1957) and The Adventures of Judge Roy Bean (1955-1956) and it wasn’t uncommon for two separate movies to be shooting on opposite sides of the street.

Being such a short distance from Palm Springs, I decided to make the drive to see what Pioneertown was all about in a day and age when westerns are no longer all the rage. Though I anticipated some authentic-looking buildings, much like the few I had encountered while in the small towns of South Dakota, I was really surprised by the number of buildings which comprised the town and its credibility.

As I arrived a bit early in the morning, I discovered that I was one of only three people wandering the dusty main street, Mane Street. Beginning in the Film Museum and Trading Post, I marveled at the collection of memorabilia on display and watched the film which narrated the story of this historic town.

Walking west on the north side of the street, I photographed and inspected each of the buildings and businesses that occupied their spaces…the General Mercantile and its souvenirs, the Pottery and its artwork and the Chapel, which to my dismay, was locked. There were weathered wagons, rusty mine cars and remnants of old machinery littering the street as well as a few artful pieces.

To say that the residents of Pioneertown have a bit of humor is an understatement. Barrel cactuses wearing sunglasses and quirky signage was prominent, but they really fooled me near the Mercantile. My curiosity got the best of me as I saw a barrel, covered with mesh wire and topped with the sign, “Warning! Baby Rattlers”. I half-expected to see small snakes slithering around the bottom, but that seemed like such a hazard…instead, the bottom was lined with baby rattles…yes, the kind baby’s like to shake!!!

As I approached the Bath House and Hotel, I stepped onto the boardwalk, I and passed the Bank and the Livery. Many buildings were inaccessible as they were now private residences. At the end of Mane Street, I stopped to inspect the town’s Ok Corral, the Sheriff’s Office and the U.S. Post Office, said to be the most photographed branch in the United States.

*Pioneertown Post Office and Sheriff’s Office*

I made my way back up the south side of the street, I noticed that more visitors were making their way amongst the buildings. Although still eerily quiet, it must have been quite the site during its prime to see horses hitched to their posts and gunslingers ready for duel…of course with cameras recording!

Approaching the Hay and Feed Store (53585 Mane Street), I learned that this was the location of the current sound stage. Today, though not in the capacity as it was started, the town still functions as a production set where movies, independent films, music videos and commercials are filmed quite regularly. Some of the more familiar titles you might recognize are Ice Cube’s I Rep That West Music video (2010), Kenny Roger’s The Gambler (2014), Cyndi Lauper’s Funnel of Love music video (2016) and Ingrid Goes West (2017), which I had actually seen!

Finally, I completed my walk and headed to the Pappy + Harriet’s Grill for a bite to eat. Sadly, I was visiting on a day in which it was closed, but there was still a few more things to see. The Wild West and Stunt Show arena was closed but I was able to peek through the fence to see its primitive hay bale seats and old west architectural set. A little further, I spotted the Pioneertown Motel…the perfect spot to spend to live out my cowgirl fantasy…horseback riding by day, marshmallows by the campfire and a short stumble home from the Red Dog Saloon!

Though the original intent of Pioneertown is much different than what it has evolved into, it is now a destination where regular folk can live out their cowboy fantasies in the Wild, Wild West…whether for the day, the night, or as the residents do…for a lifetime!

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Pioneertown

https://visitpioneertown.com/
Address: 53626 Mane St, Pioneertown, California, USA 92268
Hours: 24 hours, daily
Admission: free
Getting There: From downtown Palm Springs. Head north on Indian Canyon Drive past Interstate 10. Turn right onto CA-62 E and continue for 13 miles. Turn right onto Pioneertown Road and drive for 4.4 miles. Pioneertown will be on the right with parking behind Pappy + Harriet’s Grill.

A Desert Treasure

Las Vegas is an interesting place!

I think anyone who has ever been there can agree with that statement and as many times as I have been there over the years, it always seems like there is something new (and often crazy) that astounds me!

Having had enough of the crowds on the Strip, I had decided to rent a car for a little expedition away from the city. I knew I was heading towards Rachel, Nevada to experience the E.T. Highway, but since I had a car at my disposal, I decided that I had better do a quick search on my phone to see if there was anything else going on in the area.

Spotting an article about an art installation ten miles south of Las Vegas, I, at first, thought I was a bit late. But the pictures…oh they were intriguing!

Continuing my research, I learned that The Seven Magic Mountains (as it was called) was a large-scale exhibition, created by Swiss artist Ugo Rondinone, and is located near Jean Dry Lake and Interstate 15. It was installed in the desert on May 11, 2016 and was originally slated to remain for two years. Given an extension until the end of 2021, thankfully, it was still there!

Even though it was completely in the opposite direction of where I was initially headed, I decided that it would be worth the detour.

The drive was easy and as I approached from Las Vegas Boulevard South, I could see the stark contrast of the colorful, stacked boulders against the desert landscape.

If you’ve ever hiked a trail where rocks are present, you may have seen human-made, stacks of rocks called cairns. These stacks are often used as memorials or landmarks. This is immediately what I though of when I gazed upon the boulders in the desert from the parking area. In fact, as I walked along the path toward the installation, many people had made small cairns along the way.

It was the commanding presence of the art installation itself and the striking colors, however, that made me gasp, when I stood in their shadows.

Seven towers of colorful, stacked boulders stand more than thirty feet high, soaring above you in the clear, desert sky. It was unlike anything I had ever seen! Colossal stones, painted in vivid hues and stacked in the middle of the Nevada desert…but why? I had no idea but it was one of the most captivating displays I had ever lain my eyes upon.

As I walked among these massive pillars, I was amazed, not only for the amount of visitors to the site (which really is out in the middle of nowhere), but also how the Stonehenge-like monoliths were constructed.

Since I was heading to the E.T. Highway, I thought about the stories and myths that have long accompanied Area 51.

It Ugo Rondinone a cover? Could it be aliens?

In the spirit of the day’s trip, I’ll go with that!

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Seven Magic Mountains

http://sevenmagicmountains.com/
Address: S Las Vegas Blvd, Las Vegas, NV 89054
Hours: 24 hours, daily
Admission: free
Getting There: Take I-15 South from the Las Vegas Strip. Follow I-15 S to Sloan Rd in Enterprise. Take exit 25 from I-15 S . Merge onto I-15 S . Take exit 25 toward Sloan Rd. Drive to Las Vegas Blvd S in Sloan. Turn left onto Sloan Rd. Turn right onto Las Vegas Blvd S. The installation can be seen from the interstate.