1 Day at Joshua Tree National Park
Legend has it that Joshua trees were named by Mormon settlers who upon seeing the trees while crossing the Mojave desert were reminded of a biblical story in which Joshua reaches his hands up to the sky in prayer.
We visited this National Park on an 8 day California and Utah road trip (8 DAYS IN CALIFORNIA AND UTAH: Joshua Tree + Death Valley + Vegas + Zion + Bryce Canyon).
Where to Stay: Although there are a few options of small cities to stay at near the park (including camping in the park), we chose to stay in Yucca Valley for our stay, which was just a short drive into the park the next morning.
As we stayed in Yucca Valley, we started out our day from the North side of the park and headed South over the day (see map of Joshua Tree National Park). We didn’t do any long trails on our visit, but did a couple of shorter trails. This park can easily be accomplished in one full day!
- Stops on our 1 Day Itinerary:
The Hidden Valley Nature Trail is a short 1 mile loop that brings you up close to the desert ecosystem that makes Joshua Tree unique. It only took us about ~30 minutes to complete with a few pit stops for photos. We visited in early November, but it was already hot by the time we ended this trail!
STOP 2: KEYS VIEW LOOKOUT
Next we made a quick pit stop to the Keys View. The parking lot is large and a few steps up a short trail bring you up to the great views.
LUNCH AT THE HIDDEN VALLEY NATURE TRAIL PICNIC AREA
We headed back to the Hidden valley Nature Trail area for a lunch stop.
BEWARE: bees love it here!! And they love your food too! It was hard to finish eating because of the number of bees that tried to swarm our food.
STOP 3: BARKER DAM TRAIL
Although, we were looking forward to seeing the Barker Dam, the dam itself was dried up when we visited. However, we still enjoyed this trail as it it brought us close to large Joshua trees. These trees are larger than the ones you see on the Hidden Valley Nature Trail. The Barker Dam Trail also ends at some petroglyphs.
Up close with Joshua Trees 
Barker Dam was dried up when we visited 
STOP 4: SKULL ROCK + ROCK CLIMBING
This was the most adventurous part of the day! Skull Rock is probably the best photo opportunity available in the park and is a popular pit stop. Parking is located on the side of the road a few feet next to the rock. The more fun part of this stop was the rock climbing/bouldering that we did here.
STOP 5: CHOLLA CACTUS GARDEN
The Cholla Cactus Garden is a quick pit stop consisting of a short 0.25 mile hike around a large field of cholla cacti. The cacti look fuzzy and soft from afar, but this trail brings you up close to these dangerous plants. In fact, there was a dead rat on one of the cactuses, killed by the sharp spikes!
NOTE: We had actually wanted to stop at the Ocotillo Garden on the way down to the Cottonwood Spring, but on passing it in our car we realized it was nothing more than two large ocotillos and was unlabeled/unmarked. Not worthy of a pit stop. We kept driving on to stop 6.
STOP 6: COTTONWOOD SPRING
If there is one thing we wish we had done differently on our day, it would have been doing the full 1.5 mile hike to the large Lost Palms Oasis. Unfortunately, it was winter when we visited and we were running out of daylight, so we headed out after taking a few pictures at the smaller oasis by the parking lot.
This national park was a part of a larger California and Utah National Park road trip. View our other National Park Itineraries, 8 DAYS IN CALIFORNIA AND UTAH: Joshua Tree + Death Valley + Vegas + Zion + Bryce Canyon