Desert Queen Mine and Wash, Joshua Tree National Park

Date	Distance	Time	Elevation Gain	Average Moving Time	Year to Date Miles
1/1/2018	3.6 miles				3.6

Map: National Geographic Joshua Tree Map
Guide book: Hiking Joshua Tree National Park, a Falcon Guide
Directions: Hike #24 in guide book, Desert Queen Mine and Wash

We both woke up tired. Glen wanted a recovery day. We hadn't planned any non-hiking activities. After breakfast, he felt better, so we decided to do some hiking after all. We decided to try the parking area for the Desert Queen Mine, a hike we weren't able to do before because the lot was full. We arrived at 8:15 am, and the parking area was good! The book described this as a 4 mile out and back hike. I love doing a New Year's Day hike. It always feels like a good way to start off a year.

The trail was a combination of sandy wash and rocky terrain. Our first stop was the remains of a miner's home. After that, we headed downhill on a rocky path. We arrived at a sandy wash and turned left. This area has many mines, with side trails to many of them. The side trails are above the sandy wash. The more you look around, the more mines you can find. We continued down the sandy wash past the mines. We did some boulder scrambling. At one point there was a swarm of bees in the boulder area, so I found a way around them. At 1.8 miles (.2 miles short of Johnny's Camp, our destination), we got stuck. There was a difficult boulder scramble. The book says there is a game path to the left, but we couldn't find it. We both tried to figure out how to do the boulder scramble safely, but gave up. I think I got further than Glen, but part way down, there were more bees. I wasn't particularly happy about the number of bees, so turned around. On the return trip, as we were heading back to the miner's home, we managed to get slightly off trail. We found the trail and hiked over to it. Glen accidentally stepped on a cactus. Oh dear. The thorns went right through the thick rubber in his shoes into his feet. They were impossible to pull out of his shoe. He ended up rubbing a rock inside his shoe to try to break off the ends of them. One of the beautiful cacti we got to see in this area were barrel cacti. They are red, so stand out from the yellows/browns/greens. We got back to our car and took a lunch break.

Up next.....Pine City.

Miner's home

Some mine shafts

Barrel Cactus thorns 

And a video....