California bound
The magnificent Joshua tree is the star of the scrub in the eponymous national park in California, finds Laura Millar
Exploring Joshua Tree National Park
Only a few minutes in, and I’m humming U2’s I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For, as my hardy local guide, Nancy Cohee, steers us through the entrance gates of Joshua Tree National Park. Ironically, she tells me, the artwork for the cover of the band’s 1987 number one album, The Joshua Tree, wasn’t shot in the park at all, but 200 miles away. But then these iconic plants, known officially as Yucca brevifolia, grow plentifully throughout the Mojave Desert, which sprawls across nearly 50,000 square miles, covering much of southeastern California (and Nevada). Named by a group of Mormon settlers who were crossing the desert in the 19th century, and who believed they resembled the prophet Joshua throwing his arms out to welcome them, up close, they are strikingly lovely. A slender, brown trunk splits out into several offshoot branches, which divide again, each topped with a spray of long, thin, green, spiky leaves, which look like a bottle brush. And, as we drive through the park, whole forests of them stand to attention, looking like something out of a Dr Seuss cartoon against the bright blue spring sunshine.
It’s been a long-held dream of mine to visit, and I’m surprised when Nancy tells me this has only been officially recognised as a park since 1994. “Before then, it was classified as a National Monument,” she explains. “And before that, it was just public land, famous for its goldmines.” Yes, there was gold in them thar hills; it was discovered in the area in the 1870s, and mined up until the 1960s; today there are more than 300 closed and abandoned mines around the park itself, some of which you can still visit. Then, in the 1920s and 30s, thanks to an old wagon road called Highway 62, it started becoming more accessible to people from LA and the coast. The route was used to transport goods into the small towns which had sprung up nearby, including Joshua Tree, Twentynine Palms and Yucca Valley, and bring the gold out.
People would come and camp in the desert, but they would also dig up cacti which were hundreds of years old, hoping to plant them in their backyards at home. They’d even light the trees on fire at night, for illumination. Today, nature lovers have a woman called Minerva Hamilton Hoyt to thank for the park’s preservation; an environmental activist, concerned about the way the desert was being treated, she canvassed Franklin D Roosevelt, who in 1936 designated 800,000 acres of the area as a National Monument. However, homesteads were being built there, and cattle allowed to graze, so in 1994 it was fully designated a National Park, whose natural resources are protected from activities such as hunting, fishing, or sport.
The terrain is hauntingly beautiful; all around us are distinctive, crumbling piles of rock, which look like they were created inside the earth’s crust, but have evolved thanks to volcanic movement pushing them up and outward. Some of them look like they’ve been precariously stacked and are about to topple off, or slide to the ground, when in actual fact they’ve been stuck in those formations for millions of years. The area is crisscrossed by numerous hiking trails, there are several camping sites scattered throughout,
There are more than 300 closed and abandoned mines around the park itself