Snowy Joshua Trees and The Return Home to Bishop

 1/20 - The Caliente motel was my least favorite accommodation during my road trip. There was food and coffee available for a continental breakfast, but a sign in the kitchen read, "limit one per person." This made me roll my eyes and made me want to drive away as soon as possible. 

After brushing off a layer of powdery snow from my car from the overnight storm, I was back on the road, heading west. Luckily, this day was completely sunny after the snowstorm moved off overnight. I felt myself settling into the kind of zone where I only focus on the road in front of me in my desire to go home. But at one point, I snapped out of it when I saw something I hadn't seen before: a grove of Joshua trees with a fresh coating of snow! 

Of course I had to stop to photograph this scene because the early morning light made this snowy, Mojave Desert landscape magical. It was a wonderful conclusion to the road trip, just one more thing I hadn't seen along with all of the other places and things I hadn't seen before with my own eyes. 

I departed from this blanketed grove of Joshua trees and raced along the lonely, long and straight highways of Nevada's interior. These are the kind of roads that stretch forever, that allow you to drive as fast as you wish because there are no state troopers to enforce speed. There is just sagebrush, vast valleys and jagged low-elevation mountains. 

I stopped in Tonopah for lunch and then continued over Montgomery Pass. Eventually I glimpsed the familiar shapes of the Eastern Sierra and a few miles later, I had returned to Bishop with a sigh of relief. 

So ended my epic road trip. This 13-day, 2,500-mile journey certainly satisfied one of my fantasies. I had been studying maps of those parts of Utah and Arizona for a long time. To finally be able to make it a reality meant the world to me. I took nearly 4,000 photos on this trek split between the Nikon and my old and venerable iPhone 6. 

This adventure actually exceeded my expectations. While I had a feeling before my departure that this was going to be one of the greatest things I had done in my life, the reality was that it was even greater than I thought it would be. The two nights in Monument Valley surpassed any fantasy of mine, becoming the best part of my travels, and Arches National Park was my second favorite. These two locations presented boatloads of some sort of natural energy to me, while I stared in awe every which way I could look.

The main reason for the trip was the hike to The Wave in the Pariah Canyon Wilderness on the Utah/Arizona border; it was my third favorite part of the road trip. I didn't feel any energy there like I did in Monument Valley and Arches National Park, but the landscape was totally alien and fascinating to me, perfect for photography. 

3/19 - In the days and weeks that have passed since this road trip, I have been fantasizing about other road trips in the future. I would love to go back to Canyonlands and properly explore the park with an off-road vehicle. I want to explore the Escalante River Canyon more and return to Arches. I will return to Monument Valley someday. Perhaps I should do the next trip during a warmer part of the year...

Other ideas of mine have been to drive to Glacier National Park in Montana. I want to see Banff National Park and Jasper National Park in the Canadian Rocky Mountains. I want to drive across the continent of Australia on a motorcycle and see Uluru! 

But for now, I'll lay low and save some money. Writing about this road trip has been a pleasure and I will savor the memories for the rest of my life.