Heading Towards the Mountains

We’ve been spending the week with family in Palm Springs, California this week.  The children and I have never been here before but my husband and most of his family have been here before.  My son was disappointed in that the desert didn’t look like Sahara sand dunes.  It took some explaining that the desert was a qualification based on annual rainfall and not so much quantity of sand and even then, I’m not sure he believes us.

Visually to me, from the hardscape to the flora, it does look like a desert for the most part.   Only it’s a desert stuck in a valley, surrounded by mountains.   And the mountains are omnipresent.

I thought on the first day I had an idea where we were going because we left from the Marriott site and headed “directly towards the mountains”.   We went a certain distance and got to our dinner location.    The second day we repeated this procedure to head for our morning activity, only things didn’t look familiar as we headed towards those mountains.  

It was then that I realized we were surrounded by mountains in virtually all directions.   You couldn’t see how this was the case from where we were staying but after a few trips in different directions (that felt like a single direction) I figured it out.

Later in the week we’re heading up into the mountains, maybe then I’ll get to see how much of the area is truly surrounded and figure out which direction we need to go if we plan on escaping to head back home.

The Big Boy Update:  We were at The Living Desert zoo this morning.   It was hot.  It was sunny.   My son was cranky.   He was so unhappy at one point he complained loudly, “I’m hot.  I’m going to heat to death.”

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter’s vision is getting worse.  Fortunately she’s having cataract surgery in a week (more information to follow) but for now we’re just working with her through it.   Today she did say something that surprised both my husband and me because she’s never given any indication she even notices if her glasses are clean or filthy dirty.   She said at lunch, “I can’t see; my glasses are so foggy.”