Adventures in Quartzsite

Last Saturday, we headed out into the desert for another Jeep trek with two other Jeeps.

We drove into the mountain area for a little while and then stopped here for lunch.

Most of the trail was just gravel, but some areas had more rocks than this.

Crossing one of the dry washes.

We learned that one of the palm trees in our RV park is a date palm. There are ripe dates growing on the yellow branches.

On Monday, our friends from Saylorville invited us to go Phoenix to the Ikea store. They had arranged to have lunch there with another couple from Saylorville. It was an interesting store, but according to the pictures that I took, I was most impressed by the job that the electricians did installing these overhead conduits. They certainly took pride in their work!

We spotted this guy out one one of our desert treks. He appeared to be old and lame.

On Wednesday, we took a tour out to the Harquahala Mine with the Quartzsite Historical Society. It was about an eight mile drive out to the mine from the town of Solome. There used to be a town of about 500 people here when the mine was active. The cemetary has about 50 graves, many of which are no longer marked. This is the only one with a concrete marker. There are no names on any of them.

The building in the background looked like a dynamite storage building with a water tank on top.

The view from an old building site.

A closeup of the dynamite storage building.

Not much left of the old mine supervisor's house.

We just worked on projects around here for most of the rest of the week. Yesterday I helped cook the Christmas dinner at the QIA community center. Non-traditional dinner, gumbo with red beans and rice.

Off Roading in the Desert

On Monday, we were invited to take an off road trip with two other Jeep owners. We were supposed to be going up to the top of a mountain here to have lunch, but they were unfamiliar with the trail and we didn't find the turn off to get to the top. We started out following a power line access trail.

We stopped in a pass and had lunch by the road.

Some of the sections of trail were steep.

We made it back safely and are going with them again tomorrow. We finally got around to doing some Christmas decorating this week.

Joshua Tree National Park

The saguaro cactus (the tall ones with arms) are very numerous around this area.

Quartzsite is famous for being surrounded by Bureau of Land Management ground where anyone can just park their RV and dry camp wherever they want to. Some areas of it, you can pay a small fee for a few months and have access to water and a sewer dump. No electricity is available, so you see a lot of solar panels and generators.

The town uses symbols of camels in memory of a local character called Hi Jolly.  To see who he was, click here.

Our friends from Iowa here invited us to go to the Joshua Tree National Park on Thursday and we enjoyed the trip. These are the Joshua trees that the park is named after.

Much of the park landscape is similar to this.

There is a ranger led tour of the Keys Ranch in the park that we had reservations for. Ranger Dave led our tour and did a great job! The ranch school house is in the background. Bill Keys employed a teacher there for his kids and some others in the neighborhood. Eventually they began to be paid by the state.

 The tour began near here where several Native American artifacts were found.

This is a closeup of the rock at the bottom of the picture above. In the center of the circle of smaller rocks is a large depression formed by the Native Americans using it to grind grain and seeds.

Another interesting rock formation.

Bill Keys moved into the area around 1910, and raised his family on the ranch. He was a miner, raised cattle and was a jack of all trades. The park has left his ranch just as it was when he left it.

His corral and workshop.

Their cabin.

A hand operated rock drill.

A one cylinder gas engine driven stamp mill to pulverize the ore to extract the gold.

More of the stamp mill.

He built and repaired all kinds of equipment, so he had piles of parts to use.

Plumbing supplies.

A horse drawn mower, apparently they were able to raise some pasture grass to harvest.

Old kitchen stoves.

An early camp stove.

A Mack truck with hard rubber tires that didn't require air. One of his sons continued to visit the place and actually started this truck up a few years ago. Chain drive to the rear wheels.

No modern bathrooms there.

They had a problem with coyotes getting the chickens, so they would put them in this old car at night.

Some of the old wagons, the middle one was a Studebaker.

This was used to plow the garden.

An old Fordson tractor with a buzz saw on the front to cut firewood.

I bet his wife was glad when they got this Maytag washing machine. Gas engine powered.

At one time, his wife had a little store in this building. Selling canned goods to neighbors.

Bill traded a mine for this Jeep and one of his boys built the cab out of another old car.

He and another gentleman were very good at laying rock and built this chimney on the house.

The only refrigeration was this screened in addition on the kitchen. It was wrapped in burlap which was kept damp from the water pan on top. The breeze would blow through and keep it cool. One of the kids had to fill the pan three times a day.

Bill's homemade rock hoist which allowed him to move rocks by himself when building the wall beside it.

One of Bill's homemade rock walls to protect the house from floods.

He had a bad back and would lay on this bench and have one of the kids tie the rope to his boots and crank up the winch to stretch out his back in the evening.

A young Joshua tree growing by the house.

There were three ways to pump water from this well, the hand pump, the windmill, and a gas engine powered pump.

Originally the only method was this windlass and bucket. One of the children was getting water one day and didn't secure the handle well after raising the bucket. When it came loose the handle hit him in the head and killed him.

The rear of the house where a large garden and orchard were located.

Some broken pottery and glass in front of the school house.

One of the Joshua trees along the road to the visitor's center.

The resident roadrunner at the visitor's center.

A hummingbird in a bush at the visitor's center

We left the park and drove down to the Salton Sea State Park for a short visit.

It was a long but fun day. Last night was the Christmas parade here. Lots of ATVs and SBSs decorated with lights.

 Tomorrow we are heading out into the desert with two other jeep couples for a trail ride. Should be fun.