Hollywood to Joshua Tree

Our amazing friends, Seana and Dave, left their garage door open all weekend so we could nose our RV, Reba, in and close their gate for the Hollywood Bowl Phish run in L.A. After an unforgettable weekend of music 🎶 and friends, we started the official national park tour portion of our adventure. We had originally booked a hipcamp with a pool and hot tub near Joshua Tree that claimed it was 2WD accessible and on a dirt road. Sadly, it was a sand road with a steep and severely rutted driveway to access the camp. We almost got stuck several times in spinning sand and damaged the back bumper slightly executing an 8 point turn to get out. We did not know it yet but the jarring also caused a transmission leak. No adventure is without mishaps but I am miffed that he not only refused a refund but still has not updated the listing so others can avoid our fate. Update: Received a refund from the Hipcamp. We called our friend Seth to explain our predicament and he recommended we all head to Pioneertown, a town that serves as a movie set for Westerns, for a delicious meal at Pappy and Harriet's. We met a new friend celebrating his 58th Birthday and enjoyed beers and dinner before boondocking behind the restaurant.
We rose early and headed into Joshua Tree National Park. We started our adventure at Barker Dam trail, a short but gorgeous hike with ancient petroglyphs and abundant flora and fauna.
From Barker Dam we continued to Key's View for a view of the park and expanded area as far as the Sultan Sea.
Our next stop was a hike to Skull Rock, an amazing area of rock formations.
After a delicious cauliflower taco dinner at our Cottonwood Springs campsite, we donned our headlamps and headed up a trail to stargaze. Joshua Tree has some of the best stargazing in the country. We saw a strange phenomena that looked like Santa's reindeer lit up in the sky. After many hours of deliberation, we learned it was Starlink after returning to the land of cell signal.
We woke up bright and early for our favorite and final hike, Mastondon Peak Trail. The pics don't do this magical place justice. Afterwards, Seth departed for his home in Phoenix and we started the drive to Lake Havasu State Park.
Gorm's musical selection for this portion of the trip: Steely Dan, The Royal Scam https://open.spotify.com/album/1Sur33x6g7tvdd9GQnHhhu?si=QzigCC2vTriKVMtq1lmqFA

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