Wonderland Ranch
Joshua Tree may be a National Park today, but, back in the day, cattle roamed the scrub brush and miners wandered in search of gold. This history remains in arrested decay along the Wall Street Mill trail in the Wonderland of Rocks.
Category California
Read MoreWonderland Ranch
Desert Christ Park
Desert Christ Park is an early foray into biblically themed parks. It's not nearly to the state of gems you might find in Kentucky, but it has it's own charm as it attempts some earnest Greco-Roman styling in plaster and rebar. While it may not constitute very fine art, it's scale makes for some great group pictures.
Noah Purifoy’s Outdoor Desert Art Museum
Noah Purifoy's Outdoor Desert Art Museum fills ten acres of "environmental statues" outside of Joshua Tree, California. Visitors wander down a dirt road to the yard of towering sculptures of found art. Toilets, bowling balls, hooks, rope, and scrap metal find their place in 3D collages and weird structures.
Krblin Jihn Kabin
The Kabin may be part of the Kcymaerxthaere series of pieces by Eames Demetrios but it certainly stands on its own in drawing your attention into an alternate world. This dilapidated "Kabin" on the outskirts of a housing development in Joshua Tree, California feels as if we had crossed into an alternate timeline. The Krblin Jihn Kabin is a faux-historic preserve where religious dissidents were exiled. It is complete with explanatory panels and plaques outlining the historic context and traditions.
Robolights
Robolights has been the continuing project of Kenny Irwin Jr. since 1986. What was intended as a dystopian Christmas display of robots and found objects has become a block spanning marvel for visitors any day of the year. We happened to come by in January and were not disappointed.
Palm Springs
Get ready to be jealous, because we are in Palm Springs. We are renting a house with a pool in the back. Thus, the first thing we attended to was cooling off in the water as the sun set. Along with the conventional walks through town, we spiced up out visit with attractions gathered from the Atlas Obscura. We visited a memorial structure preserved from the fictional civil war between north and south California. We trudged through a series of outdoor sculptures on the outskirts of a Joshua Tree suburb. And we enjoyed the crumbling remains of an early attempt at a biblical attraction with sculptures depicting religious scenes with heavy roman aesthetic.
The Cabazon Dinosaurs
Dinosaurs mean a lot of different things to different people. To children, they are awesome monsters and rubber toys. To the movie buff, they mean Jurassic Park and apocalyptic fears of science. To Young Earth creationists, they are the embodiment of biblical monsters that roamed the earth beside humans for the 6,000 years that the world existed.
Huntington Gardens
Though we do live in an old van under a bridge, we do—on very rare occasion—take a shower and do something cultured. For our annual show, we decided to celebrate by visiting the Huntington Gardens in Pasadena, CA. It is one of the most beautifully composed gardens we have visited. It boasts vistas one can just sit...muse...or have our version of business meetings. We have the best business meetings.
Paso Robles
There's a lot of vineyards for sale in Paso Robles. With those rolling hills and coastal breezes, I can think of few better places to park my retro van and just relax. Then again, it's not as if relaxation requires you to be a land owner. This is wine country, after all, and many a winery has a tasting room open for your education and delight. Of course, we focused on Zinfandels. There are vines in Paso Robles that survived prohibition and there are wineries that have continued the traditions of wine making in Paso Robles. We were fans.
Santa Monica
Well, this is it, guys, the end of Route 66. Ignore that we only picked it up in Oklahoma City and missed everything to the north east. Ignore that we never attempted to spend more than the token amount of time driving the original route, rather than I-40. Ignore our frequent deviations from the route for one stop or another. Instead, bask with us in the sun of the clear crisp day that we walked down Santa Monica Pier to the Pacific Ocean and arbitrarily decided that this meant we had completed our journey.