R and I went to Palm Springs for our anniversary trip a couple months back, and it was super fun! Palm Springs is a desert town located about 2 hours away from where I live now. I heard that it is famous as a tourist destination as well as a retirement place for the rich.
We left for Palm Springs on Sunday night, stopped by Morongo Valley Casino for a dinner buffet (YES we love to eat dinner buffet!). The buffet is not bad at all although the food selection is not as diverse as the ones in Las Vegas. After buffet, we continued our drive to Palm Springs, checked in to our motel and rest for the night.
We stayed in a newly renovated motel called Infusion Beach Club. It is located not too far from the city center, but Palm Springs is a small town anyway so there’s nothing too far here. Last time we checked the motel was still in soft launch phase, so there were a couple of works being done, but I could tell that it’s going to be a great motel once everything is finished.
After a good rest, we started the day early because we wanted to catch the sunrise at Joshua Tree. The national park is located about an hour drive from Palm Springs, so we left at around 6, arrived just in time before sunrise and managed to see the beautiful view within the park. It was magical! We didn’t explore the park much (it’s a BIG park), just drove by and stopped here and there to enjoy the scenery, but we still managed to see a lot of out-of-this-world scenery. Here are some pictures 🙂
Before going back to the motel, we stopped by Crossroads Cafe, a small diner in Joshua Tree’s main street. It was one of the best breakfast that we have had, R even said he would make the drive from Orange County just to get the breakfast 😀
We had about an hour and a half to kill before our check out time so we decided to enjoy the pool in our motel, there was barely anybody besides us so it felt like swimming in our own private pool hehe. Although tiny, the pool area had this Bali-style beach club so there’s nothing to complain about!
After checking out, we decided to explore Palm Spring’s downtown and stopped by a couple of cool spots. One of my favorite spots is Ace Hotel Palm Springs, where we had THE BEST Nutella cheesecake at their King’s Highway Diner.
Our next stop was Palm Springs Aerial Tramway. Now, this is the coolest spot. The tramway gets you to Mount St. Jacinto Peak from the desert with just a 10-minute ride. It cost $25.95 per person, which I think worth every penny. The view at the top is really pretty – you can also hike and even camp at the peak. Enjoy the pictures 🙂
We went back after sunset and drove home. It took us about 1,5 hours to get home – it was a long day but very memorable. I really recommend Palm Springs if you want to have a quick getaway from Los Angeles or Orange County. Now, tell me, when’s the last time you had a quick getaway?