Trek Date: March 12, 2017

With all the rain JTree had received over the winter, there's been a lot of talk about 2017 being an excellent year for wildflowers in Joshua Tree National Park. Even though it wasn't technically springtime, I thought I'd head out to see what I could find. I wasn't disappointed.

Murbachi provided some recent intel regarding the main portion of the park, which was: not much color as-of-yet. However, both he and I knew that things might be different in the southern, lower, warmer portion of the park.

Entering at the north gate (tip: always less crowded than the west entrance), I turned left at Pinto Wye and headed towards Cottonwood Springs, keeping an eye out for color. There's always some blooms along the roadways, small white and yellow things with sometimes a blue splash thrown in for good luck. I stopped a couple miles before reaching the Cholla Gardens, and after gathering together my gear, set out to find the El Dorado Mine. I spotted the occasional early bloomer along the way, and that seems to be the trick. Stop the car, get out and hike, you'll find stuff.