A beautiful day dawned as the kids decided that 5:00 AM was a good time for us all to get up.Fortunately they're not in total control and Tina was able to convince them that it was too early to get up. So, after turning on the heat, we all laid back down for another 45 minutes. Then it was definitely time to rise as the "Punky" Alarum went off and we were showered with lots of licks and her own form of communication, paw pats. Yes, Paw Pats. This is where she sits or stands and lifting one front paw, she taps out morse code on the closest body part. In bed it's my chin as she stands on my chest. Okay. So.... well, I think it's time to get up, heheheh!!
After breakfast, walks and cleanup, we headed out for the Big Morongo Canyon Wildlife Preserve (http://www.bigmorongo.org/) which is located, naturally, in Morongo Valley. The 31,000 acre preserve sits in the heart of the Little San Bernardino Mountains and opens at the bottom into the west end of the Coachella Valley northwest of Desert Hot Springs. Elevations on the Preserve range from 1,700 feet on the canyon floor to 3,430 feet at the ridge tops.
To get there we drove 18 miles north from Hemet to I-10 and turned east for about 22 miles exiting on highway 62 for the twelve mile drive up to Morongo Valley. Bythe time we got there it's about noon and we're getting hungry so we stopped for lunch at the Morongo Valley Cafe located in the middle of town. It looked pretty busy and there weren't any outside seats available so Tina went in and asked where else we could get lunch. But it smelled so good that she decided we should wait, whereupon the waitress came out with a couple more chairs and we joined another couple outside. This was good because we could have the kids with us rather than leave them in the car.
Tina ordered a Patty Melt, while I had the Ultimate Egg Sandwich. This was two fried eggs, with a sausage patty, cheese, onions, avocado and jalepenas. Ohhhh, it was really good. This place probably could be featured on Guy Fieri's, Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.
We finished lunch and continued up highway 62 another half mile to the entrance to the Preserve. We drove in and were preparing to park when Tina saw the sign, "No Dogs Allowed". We were really disappointed, especially as I should have checked before we left home. Oh well, we'll come back again next week and do some hiking.Since we couldn't stay, maybe we should make it a driving day and do the loop down to Palm Springs and back to Hemet via Highway 74, the "Pines to Palms Highway" over the San Jacinto mountains. So we headed back down highway 62 past the community of Desert Springs, across I-10 through North Palm Springs and south on highway 111 to Palm Springs (http://www.visitpalmsprings.com/).
Since it was Saturday and beautiful out, the streets and sidewalks were crowded with people spilling out of high end shops and filling the outdoor cafes. We didn't have any place in particular we wanted to see in particular since we really hadn't planned to be there until a couple of weeks out. The aeriel tramway (http://www.pstramway.com/) would have been nice but there was still snow at the top and we weren't dressed for cold weather. So it was time to find a map as I didn't remember where we could find highway 74.
I figured that the Chamber of Commerce would be close to the City Municipal building so we turned around and drove east for a mile before I gave up and pulled into the Renaissance Palm Springs Hotel. I parked next to valet parking and went in to the lobby. The lady at the registration desk sent me to the gift shop for a map, but the only one they had was for the local area. Fortunately, the lady told me to check with the head porter as he was a long time local.
I found him near the desk and he got a map and showed me how to get where we wanted to go. Turns out his family had large farms in the Hemet Valley and also outside of Palm Springs. We chatted for a few minutes then I thanked him for his help and headed out through the front door still studying the map.
Once I got to the curb I went around the back of the car, opened the drivers door and got in. I vaguely felt something was not quite right. For one, the door seemed bigger, the drivers seat was set wrong and the A/C was off. As I was reaching for the seat belt I turned to ask Tina why the A/C was off and found myself staring at a Japanese tourist. We were both surprised! He was making "shooing" motions at me and saying "not your car, please get out". I looked through the windshield and sure enough, our car was another ten feet further up the curb. Apologising profusely, I quickly got out of his car and got in the correct one. Whooops!! My bad!! Heheheh!
As we pulled out of the hotel, I told Tina what happened and she immediately texted everybody in the family with the story. For the next twenty minutes as we drove south along the San Jacinto mountains I got various comments relayed from Tina as everybody got a chuckle over my gaffe. Leaving Palm Springs we passed through Cathedral City, Rancho Mirage and into Palm Desert where we made our turn onto highway 74. This was another beautiful drive up and over the mountains. We made several stops to look back towards the valley as we gained elevation making a final stop at the "Cahuilla Vista" pullout. After parking the car we leashed up the dogs and headed down the trail. Reaching the viewpoint platform we took some photos of flowers and the landscape around us. It was really beautiful!
Eventually we passed the summit at Lake Hemet reaching 4,760 feet elevation then started through a series of alpine meadows dotted with campgrounds, hiking trails and horse ranches. Gradually we dropped down to Mountain Center around 4,000 feet at the ridge of the long canyon leading to Hemet. We inched our way down following a series of hair raising turns, "U" turns and otherwise dramatic mountain highway finally reaching the valley floor at the eastern edge of Hemet, about six miles from the coach.Driving through town we stopped at a Starbucks to buy some whole beans and grab a couple of iced mochas. Ummmmm, mmmmm, just right. we got home in time to take the kids for a long walk. I cleaned the grill and Tina grilled some steaks, sauteed brussel sprouts and we split a baked potato with chocolate ice cream for desert. Yumm!!
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