Anniversary Trip: Red Rock Canyon State Park

We were fortunate this year that the stars aligned to allow us to get the van, fix a few things, and then have a couple of weeks to go poking around desert California to celebrate our anniversary before we got locked down again due to the covid-19 case numbers exploding.  The kiddo stayed home and had to self-feed -- which is entirely reasonable for  an 18-year-old in college.  Ha.  Parents got to goof off in an unplanned, figure-it-out-as-you-go sort of way.  We've been a bit stir-crazy all in the house all of the time, so it was good to get outside.

The general plan was to head to Death Valley and see where that took us, hiking and mountain biking along the way.  Originally, we had thought to drive through Yosemite and do some hiking there, and then head down 395, but as the trip grew closer, it became clear that the first big storm of the season was going to hit the day we left, bringing snow to the Sierras.  They closed Tioga Pass preemptively, so that route wasn't going to work.  A closer examination of the forecast indicated that it would be cold enough to snow even over Tehachapi that night, and while that wouldn't be enough to close it, we didn't want to be dealing with chains and snow early in the trip before getting used to the new-to-us vehicle.  So, we just got up early and drove fast to outrun the storm.  No random stops for recreation on that day!

After getting over the pass, I cast about for a place to stay.  Since we hadn't planned on coming this direction at all, scanning the road atlas for campgrounds seemed to be the thing to do.  I settled on Red Rock Canyon State Park, as it was vaguely in the right direction, we could get there before dark (barely), and their website indicated that they were open for first-come, first served camping.  I figured they wouldn't be full, even though it was Friday night, because it was November and a stong cold front was coming in.

We got there around 4 pm, half an hour before the sun went down.  Sunset is *early* this time of year.  This campground turned out to be really cool -- most of the the sites are tucked up agains a long eroded sandstone cliff -- and they did have spaces left, so we grabbed one.

I took a walk down to pay for the campsite, and enjoyed the views in the low-angle late afternoon light.  At $25, this was the expensive camping night of the trip -- later nights were under $10, and sometimes free.  I'm not complaining, though, as it was a neat campground and I support the state parks.

Given the good light, Chad assumed his photographer position

with predictably good results.

Fairly soon, the light disappeared, so we set up our table and cooked dinner.  As we finished up, our evening's entertainment was watching a group of young artsy LA types in improbable shoes show up at the day use parking area just past sunset and start hiking up the ridge.  When they got to the top, they lit a giant LED light bar and proceeded to set up a photo shoot on the top of the cliffs.  We watched the backlit model and photographer while they worked, and the chuckled as they then used the light bar as an enormous flashlight to get down the now pitch dark trail.  We could hear them laughing too.

The next morning, we headed up the cliff trail to take a look at the views.  In one direction you can see how the camp sites are all set up amidst the Joshua trees along the cliff.

The other directions were quite scenic too,

and one could see the road we were to follow out of the park in the distance.

A cold and windy, but very worthy, vantage point!