Joshua Tree NP, eating at the coolest restaurant and then a flash flood in the desert

It wasn't the heat that almost killed us...

Added another national park to the books and of course I got a magnet to add to my collection! Joshua Tree National Park was cool, the only downside is that we were desperately scanning the sides of the road for a glimpse of the tortoises that were supposed to be out and about right now but, alas, we didn't see any.

What we did see, however, were many ravens:

Our first stop in the park was the Cholla Cactus Garden:

We started at the south entrance so we didn't immediately see the Joshua trees as they apparently only grown in the northern part of the park. So it took a while to find them but was worth the wait:

I was looking forward to hiking to Skull Rock so was a little shocked to see it was literally right by the road and even more disappointing was that there was a group of people already there waiting their turn to take selfies:

The scenery around the whole park was great:

After Joshua Tree we made an impromptu decision to drive to the Mojave Desert using our common travel mantra "well when else are we gonna be this close?"

We were hungry though and randomly picked out a place called 'Kitchen in the Desert' in Twentynine Palms to have lunch. Wow! Not only was it aesthetically pleasing but the food *chef's kiss*

While sitting at lunch our hostess warned everyone that rain was on the way but not to worry because everyone would be easily moved inside. My travel partner and I smirked, "what's a little rain in the desert?"

We soon were on our ignorant way admiring all the quirky desert scenery (more on that in a later post!) and gorgeous vistas:

A little doubt started to creep in when we made our way down the road and noticed the aftermath of an apparently recent flash flood:

After realizing our rental car could not handle much more of these debris strewn road and with the impending doom rain clouds in the close distance we decided to skip Mojave Desert and head back to our hotel.

Here it comes!

Well, the storm caught up to us:

We were in a town at the time and the roads began to flood (there didn't appear to be any storm drains?) and at one point we felt our only option was to drive (while frantically praying) to higher ground. Ironically we found refuge in the parking lot of a church on a hill. We waited there for about 30 minutes for the rain to subside and then hesitantly made our way down the road.

Storm aftermath

That was one scary adventure I hope to never repeat! Also, I promise to take flash flood warnings in the desert a lot more seriously in the future!