Bonus Day the second!

Joshua trees! Cholla cactuses! Waking up on BLM land in the middle of Lovell Canyon is nice, but made even nice by the fact that today is a BONUS DAY! So, in my grand plan of our vacation days, I wrote down the general location for each of those days. During the last week, something wasn't computing between where we were and when we needed to be back in Las Vegas. Yesterday, I took a closer look at the plan, and realized that I had set aside an entire day for the drive from Sequoia N.P. to Ballarat. In the end, the park didn't offer as much in the way of activities to fill our day, and Mario was feeling good, so we drove to Ballarat in the dark, effectively removing the need for the extra travel day. When I realized that, I also found out that we were gaining an extra day for visiting. Now, that might have been a bad thing so late in the trip, but I had also looked at a location west of Las Vegas that was good for hiking, back when I was researching for this trip, and thought it would be a good place to visit IF we somehow found an extra day with nothing to do. Lo and behold, today is that day! This morning's oatmeal, with apple and cinnamon, tasted just a little bit sweeter.

So we drove 30 minutes from our camp site in the middle of the Mojave desert, to Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, so enjoy some of the most beautiful and colourful rocks around. I can see why this place is a draw to the nature lovers visiting Las Vegas: it's close but also far out of the city, and offers a whole range of hikes and walks. There's even a one-way scenic drive through the park, mostly to manage traffic flow, but you could even really just visit the park by driving through it in your car, if you wanted. We wanted hiking.

A quick stop at the Calico Canyon lookout to see what "calico" rocks look like. Think a mix of all the colours, like a calico cat, but more striate in pattern, given the nature of the rocks. I would almost say that the rocks are peppermint candy-striped, and look pink from a distance. 

A little research at the Visitor's Center resulted in Mario choosing the Calico Tanks hike for us today. Not too long, but offering a good amount of everything we like: views, interesting geology, varied flora and challenging sections like rock-scrambling. The first bit wound through a canyon wash, amongst holly trees and desert oak, and past a rock mound dubbed the "turtle head". 

After that, it climbed into the canyon, first on a bed of soft sand, eroded from the fragile rock walls around us. Had it been warmer, or even just warm, this would have been a good section to complete barefoot. The temperature today, however, is as cold as we've felt all trip, with the windows of the camper coated in frost this morning, so I think we'll be keeping our shoes on. 

We climb from the "grey" layer(the wash), up through the "yellow" layer to the "red" one, starting to navigate large rock stairs and small climbing sections. We are heading high up the canyon walls, so every stop requires lots of photos of the surrounding area. The more we climb, the better it gets. 

We pause for a snack about halfway up, and while I sit on a rock munching on dates, Mario climbs the surrounding red "domes".

The trail is relatively easy to find, especially if you look for the worn areas in the rock where people have treaded before. There are, however, trail markers to guide us, but sometimes they are not so obvious to spot in the landscape.

We climb higher still, past the red layer, via rock "stairs" and not stairs, and sometimes just piles. We scramble up walls that have a handful of divots for our feet, and ridges for handholds. Mario spots places for me to put my feet, and it bears mentioning that I put away my camera for this part, so I can have 4 free limbs with which to climb. Just before the top, we come to a flat section, a "tank" for which the trail is named. During rains, this area floods and becomes a pool, and evidence of marsh grasses remain. A small group of quails runs out from under them, and so I run around, trying to capture their movements. They're so cute, and they cheep quietly as they peck at the ground...Mario has to come back to get me.

One last challenging 4-limbed climb and we reach the top of the canyon, circle around to a ledge on the front of one of the now white domes, and settle in for some smushed PB&J sandwiches in the sun. From here, we can see all the way to Las Vegas and beyond, including the Strat, the hotel where we will be staying tomorrow night. For now, we just relax on our perch and enjoy the peace and tranquility of the moment, and the awesome feeling of a bonus day.

Though there were a few other trails we had marked as possible follow-ups for the Calico Tanks trail, Mario and I both feel content with our hike for the day, and calculating about 100 km of hiking total for the trip, we are leaving satisfied. We follow the rest of the Scenic Driving Route out of the park and down into Las Vegas.

What comes next is a stop at the Love's Travel Centre and one of the THE BEST SHOWERS EVER, probably because it has been about a week since the last one, and before you ask, YES, we've been "showering" other ways. I've learned that when you are camping off-grid, baby wipes become your best friend. Also, it's a good thing we like each other! We also make the best decision of the trip, and decide NOT to stay in the parking lot of the gas station. We are so close to Valley of Fire, and the BLM we stayed at on out first night of the trip, and after a quick calculation, we are well within our mileage limit, so we leave and park in the desert for one last night. I think the giant Wolf Full Moon agrees, as it guides us back to the same BLM site. Our evening is a combination of eating all the snacks left in the campervan, trying to cram entirely too much stuff into our bags for the transit to the hotel tomorrow, and just relaxing after another day filled with hiking. I don't think we even make it 10 pm tonight before falling asleep, but I know that it will be a much more relaxing sleep that at the truck stop!