Winter day in JTNP

I usually come home from the Phoenix area through Joahua Tree National Park.  It's the most scenic route...in fact, it's downright surreal.  It's a good place for people who like rocks.

 

Teddy bear chollas backlit by the low winter sun.

 

Rocks dot the landscape as if some giant just tossed them there.  In reality, the rocks of JTNP are made of magma that upwelled into softer rock layers.  The soft rock has been eroded away, and millennia of freeze/thaw cycles have split the harder rocks into piles of huge boulders.

 

The low winter sun softens the light and lengthens shadows in JTNP...it's an abstract place.

 

There are many old abandoned mines in JTNP.  This is the remnant of a house that sheltered the miners.  Looks like they forgot to take their bed along.  This mine operated from 1895 to 1961.

 

A neat addition to the desert scene...snow!  There was a cold storm earlier this week...Dec 30/31...and the higher parts of the park above 4000 feet or so received a few inches of snow.  I made the mistake of driving an unpaved road and ran into lots of slush...the car is Really Dirty now.

 

More rockpiles and Joshua Trees.

 

A Joshua soars into a crystal sky.

 

Another fine abstract scene.  A lot of artists live in these parts, down in Yucca Valley and the town of Joshua Tree...it's easy to see why.

 

A snow/rock pattern.  Nature's abstract art.