It was a beautiful morning on BLM land just south of Joshua Tree National Park:

I went for a sunrise ride into Joshua Tree, which began with a 5.5 mile, 1500 foot vertical climb:

I rode through the Cottonwood Springs campground and then continued north for another 10 miles:

After homeschool, we drove up into Joshua Tree with the RV, visited the visitor center to get our Junior Ranger workbooks, and used the campground dump station.  The moon was rising as the sun was setting:

It says a lot about a place when a dump station photograph is postcard worthy:

It was in the high 80s today, but with three fans in the RV we were comfortable.  Not that I’m complaining, I understand that it snowed this week back home.  The desert cooled quickly after sunset:

We headed back down to BLM land, as it’s free and there’s cell signal there, unlike the campground.

  See the trip map for today’s drive and our current location.