Memories

Last week, some friends and I drove to Palm Springs for a girls weekend. We stopped in Vegas for one night, went shopping on the strip the next morning, then finished the drive to Palm Springs. Marilyn Monroe was there to welcome us.

 Unfortunately, late that night one of my friends got food poisoning. She was sick (or tired and weak) for most of the trip, so we stayed pretty close to our hotel most of the time. My other friend and I walked around downtown Palm Springs and returned frequently to check on her. Palm Springs is a beautiful, fun place.

The day before we had to leave, we packed our still sick (but feeling much better) friend in the car and drove about an hour and 45 minutes to Niland and Salvation Mountain.  

Salvation Mountain is a huge sculpture created by Leonard Knight. He lived on the site from 1984 until late last year, when he had to move to a nursing home. He created the mountain from straw bales, adobe, and tens of thousands of gallons of paint. He's also painted several cars and trucks. I've wanted to see it since I first heard about it around 10 years ago, and it absolutely did not disappoint. It was a hot day, and since my friend was sick we only stayed about 45 minutes. But it was mind-blowing to spend time in a place where someone had dedicated such a huge portion of their lives working on one thing.  

We had lunch at the Buckshot Diner, and it was possibly the best meal of the trip. Great, great cheeseburgers. 

On the way back we stopped at the Salton Sea, the largest lake in California. It was a little smelly but incredibly beautiful. The history of the Sea is fascinating. We had the whole beach to ourselves, and I wish we had more time to explore the sea, but we had just stopped on a whim and were only able to stay about 20 minutes.