In February, the weather in the low desert of Southern California can vary from the high 50s to the 70s Fahrenheit. This weekend, the weather was a beautiful, sunny 75F, so we decided to hike the local Randall Henderson Trail. The trail is located just off Highway 74 in Palm Desert.
Randall Henderson, also known as “Mr. Desert,” was the founder, editor, and publisher of Desert magazine. He spent much of his life exploring and promoting the Palm Desert area. Henderson started Desert in back in 1937, when Palm Springs and the rest of the Coachella Valley was mostly desert scrubland, dirt roads, and date farms.
Today, the Coachella Valley is known for everything from Mid-Century Modernism, the BNP Peribas tennis tournament, Palm Desert’s El Paseo Drive, the Living Desert Zoo & Gardens, and golf courses galore. According to the Friends of the Desert Mountains pamphlet, the Randall Henderson trail, “celebrates Randall Henderson’s vision for Palm Desert.”
Sadly, this is a dog free hike. But it is dog free for a good reason. This time of year is lambing season for the local Big Horn sheep.
Big Horn sheep in the wild are a breathtaking sight. I have only come across them once in Anza Borego Springs almost 30 years ago. They are big, majestic animals with gracefully curving horns. On their amazingly tiny cloven hooves they can run up and down rocky outcroppings as if they were on flat ground.
The Henderson trail offers three trail options to choose from of varying distances. Each provides areas with dry desert washes, a variety of cacti and, I think, even a geologic fault line if memories of geology lessons from college are correct.
My husband is the serious hiker, so I let him choose our route for the today. This was a fairly easy 2.5 mile hike with minimal elevation gain.
Cholla cactus and the rocky landsscape we hiked in with designated paths to walk on
We saw Ocotillo cacti just starting to bloom as well as creosote bushes where the occasional lizard would dart out from below. There were many other types of living and dead cacti including cholla, barrel, and elephant ear. The main type of rock here is called ‘Salt & Pepper’ due to its distinct black and white coloration.
The rocks are composed of granite, mica, feldspar, and quartz. Depending upon how they are combined the rocks come out lighter or darker. Glinting in the sunlight they are very beautiful, but, don’t fall on them because they are very sharp and painful.
At the end of the 1.5 hour hike I was glad for a nice glass of water and a shower. Hiking in a desert is dusty! Henderson is a hike we will go on more than once to see how the desert blooms later in the spring.
Love that area!