Hail to the Victors!

Lifelong Chicagoans, we are ever on the lookout for warm-weather vacation destinations where we might thaw our bones from the seemingly interminable and frigid upper-Midwest winters. Tired of treading the well-worn trail of tears to Florida, this year we pointed our compass west and dropped a pin on Palm Springs, CA.

Palm Springs is in California’s Central Desert region where the Colorado and Mojave Deserts meet. If you go, it’s best to visit during the window of tolerable temperatures which occur roughly between December 27^th and January 3^rd.  

Given conflicting schedules, we were constrained to plan our trip during mid-May when daytime temperatures average 300 degrees and most sensible folks have fled to more hospitable climes.

We nevertheless booked a luxury Airbnb townhome with 3 bedrooms and 2 baths featuring a spacious courtyard and private pool which we could only enjoy before 8 am or after dark because any who dared take a dip during peak tanning hours would be boiled like a lobster.

Keen on seeing something of Palm Springs beyond the four walls of our townhome, we decided to head outside and explore the local geography. Heretofore fond of walks in nature, we followed the advice of our eldest daughter and settled upon a morning hike at a place called Indian Canyons on the nearby Agua Caliente Indian Reservation.  

Located just south of Palm Springs, Indian Canyons boasts two distinct ecosystems consisting of a lush, verdant valley surrounded by the arid and rocky terrain of the Agua Caliente mountains. Palm and West Palm Canyon Creeks wind through the parched hills supplying life-sustaining moisture to America’s largest growth of California Fan Palms along with the other living creatures who call this hot and unforgiving landscape home including several species of lizards, scorpions, toads, rattlesnakes, mountain lions, bobcats, and lost hikers.

Unaccustomed to desert hiking, we opted for the Victor Trail. Described in the visitor’s guide as a short, family-friendly, three-mile loop through diverse extremes, it begins in the cool shade of the towering palms shrouding meandering Palm Canyon Creek and ends in a fully exposed stretch of high desert terrain.

Locals recommend getting an early start to avoid the severe, life-threatening afternoon heat. Unless of course your older daughter wants to sleep-in, in which case you will arrive just before noon and have the whole place pretty much to yourselves.

Your adventure begins at the ranger station/trading post where most visitors stock up on drinks and snacks for the hike. We opted to travel light, toting a single backpack with one water bottle each, reserving the delights of the snack bar as a treat to look forward to upon our return.     

From the trading post, you will make an easy descent to the valley floor where you become enveloped in the cool shade of this oasis amidst the parched and unforgiving desert above. From here you will follow a wide, mostly level trail paralleling Palm Canyon Creek, enjoying the dappled sunlight sneaking between fronds of the palms lining both sides of the stream.

Passing other hikers headed back in the direction from which you came, in what seems like only minutes you will reach the abrupt end of the palm-shrouded outbound loop and find yourselves conspicuously alone at the start of the exposed 1.5-mile return trail.  

Lulled into a false sense of security by the relative comfort of the canyon trail and flush with anticipation over what awaits, your group will down a generous portion of their remaining water and eagerly step forward into a blazing crucible of heat and sunlight, the sign at the trail head warning of the dangers of sun and heat exposure now but a hazy memory.

This half of the trail is the antithesis of the first consisting of a scorched and barren landscape of scrub-encrusted hills bereft of vegetation or other humans all of whom heeded the posted admonition to avoid the midday sun.

The less sure-footed will do well to keep a steadying hand on the person in front as you navigate the narrow, rocky path which winds along a noticeable uphill grade toward the ridge above the creek.

Despite the mountain lion scat prevalent along the trail, fear not tangling with dangerous wildlife as the only living things you are likely to encounter are rocks and cacti as the local fauna is far too intelligent to venture out at this time of day.

Upon reaching the canyon’s summit which stretches skyward to within a few hundred feet of the sun, prepare to gaze in awe upon a spectacular desert panorama underscored by the green ribbon of Palm Canyon zig-zagging its way through the otherwise monotone landscape toward the Coachella Valley below. No words will escape your parched lips as the merciless sun and debilitating heat temporarily take a back seat to the unparalleled natural vista you witness before you.

As vultures circle lazily overhead, it is at this midway point on the back loop you will come to realize you’re immersed in an honest-to-goodness wilderness adventure which you probably won’t survive.

This is a good time to take a break so your older daughter, angry because she sat on a cactus, can coerce her younger sister into surrendering her remaining water in exchange for a “like” on her Snapchat story, all the while complaining how the lack of cell service is preventing her from uploading Tik Tok videos documenting her last hours on earth. 

This is also when your delirious, heat-stroked wife will look at her empty Dasani bottle and come to the panicked conclusion that the only way out is extraction by a search-and-rescue helicopter which she has no way of contacting, prompting her to crawl under a rock outcropping which affords the only shade within 200 miles that even a novice Cub Scout would recognize as an obvious nesting place for rattlesnakes.

But DO NOT WORRY!

In what seems like only four hours, the trail will descend once again into the palm-shaded valley where your molten family can lie in the cool stream in hopes of getting their body temperatures back below 190 degrees.

Meanwhile, you will climb back up and out of the canyon to the road leading to the trading post where you buy four bottles of ice-cold water emblazoned with desert hiking warnings from the Native American park ranger who shakes his head in wonder at how the white man managed to steal his people’s land.

See you on the trails! (Expect to find me alone.)