Superstition Mountain Museum
Look at Superstition Mountain. Look at the snakes. Look at the skeleton. Look wherever you like, but don't look at the camera. :)
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Road Closed Ahead
Joshua Tree National Park
After exploring the area north of Joshua Tree National Park, we had intended to drive through the park to return to Interstate 10. However, we encountered a couple signs suggesting (but not clearly stating) that the southern park entrance/exit was not accessible. As the sun set, we turned around and headed north for the long way around the park.
Noah's Art
Noah Purifoy
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| "I do not wish to be an artist. I only wish that art enables me to be."- Noah Purifoy, 1963 |
Artist Noah Purifoy spent the last 15 years of his life sculpting junked materials into art in the Mohave desert. As I walked the 10 acres of assemblage, I considered what each item might have looked like when they were created -- before many years of exposure to the desert.
Stuck
As we approached Noah's Art, we found the road to be mostly blocked by two cars stuck in the sand -- side by side. Recent rains had washed sand into an otherwise good dirt road.
We stopped and attempted to help them dig out the cars. The drivers of both cars had continued to spin their wheels after getting stuck and dug themselves deeper. One of the cars was resting on the front bumper with the wheels far off the bottom of the holes they dug. We scavenged wood and chunks of concrete from the surrounding desert and wedged those under the wheels. However, once we got traction on a wheel on one side, the power would transfer to the other wheel and it would spin. This required we get good traction under both drive wheels. We were unsuccessful in getting traction under both wheels on both cars.
It appeared that we would need to pull the cars out of their predicaments. I began searching the web for nearby shops that might have rope and be open on a Sunday afternoon. Just before I was about to go in search for rope, a passing local stopped. He was reluctant to help, but we talked him into pulling them out after he indicated that he had some rope.
Once these cars were out of the way, I successfully passed through this sand -- twice.
If you are going to drive in the desert, learn to drive in sand.
If you don't learn to drive on such roads, avoid the sand; or take your chances and hope that I come by and have learnt to keep some rope in the car so that I can pull you out.
