San Diego - Valley of Fire

This stop along our trip to San Diego actually wasn't in or near San Diego at all.  It was on the way home, in Nevada, about 40 miles north of Las Vegas.  We stopped at Valley of Fire State Park, which was amazing!

When we left San Diego Sunday night to head to Vegas, it rained with huge lightning storms the ENTIRE way!  Not just a little rain, but downpours of rain all the way.  Made for some interesting driving.  We were a little worried about our plans to go to Valley of Fire the next day, but it all turned out OK.  It was very cloudy all day Monday morning as we headed to Valley of Fire, and sprinkled a little on us while we were there.  But as soon as we left, super dark skies came, with more torrential rain all the way home until Nephi!  (about an hour from home).

Valley of Fire is named after the red sandstone formations throughout the large and desolate park which formed from shifting sand dunes during the dinosaur age about 150 million years ago.  The formations, are so colorful, they appear to be "on fire" when reflecting the sun's rays.  Well, there was no sun when we were there, but it was still amazing.

The visitors center is about 15 miles from the freeway down a long windy road leading to what looks like Mars.  Notice how colorful the rocks are!

We took a short hike to "Elephant Rock" - do you see the elephant?

Another short hike to "The Wave" - a rock that is very colorful with waves of color. We passed this giant rock wall

We passed these colorful cactus plants

This flat rock face was colorful, but the colors weren't very bright due to the overcast skies, but it was still amazing

Of course, Jacob walked along the top of the ridge

Jacob posing at the top

We really enjoyed this park and would go back when it was sunny and didn't have a threat of rain!

San Diego - La Jolla Beach

A new day brought overcast skies, but very little rain.  We headed to La Jolla Beach along the rocky coast north of San Diego for a little tide pooling.  Unfortunately this time of year, the low tide happens during the night, so it's not great for tide pooling.  We still had a great time walking along and looking in all the nooks and crannys and listening to the waves crash against the rocks.

After spending some time here, we headed a little farther north to walk to Black's Beach via the Ho Chi Minh Trail.  This "trail" is hidden in a neighborhood of multi million dollar homes and the trail is actually quite an adventure, even though it's only .4 miles long.  You "hike" through a sandstone slot canyon, cross streams, across slippery slopes using a rope to help you, and walk along cliffs where you are constantly sliding and slipping towards a 20-30 foot dropoff into a rocky gorge.  It definitely was quite an adventure, but very fun and slightly scary too!

One website describes it this way:  "Be prepared for a mini adventure which is not necessarily safe.  This trail is completely made of sandstone after all, which can crumble at any moment.  It is never safe to explore this trail after a rainfall as the sandstone becomes far weaker and is more likely to come apart.  People have been greatly injured here due to hiking after a storm.  With that said, you can look forward to crawling down sand steps, walking across a plank and a climbing down rope to get to the beach.  Are you ready?"

This trail is mostly used by surfers, who walk up and down the trail with their surfboards!  We saw two of them coming back up - and they do it all barefoot!  Once you reach the beach, it's uncrowded, and pretty much the only ones there are surfers.  There is no easy access to the beach, you can't drive up to it, so it's not used by those wanting to picnic or take a quick trip to the beach.  This beach requires effort to get to, but it's worth it for the peace and soft sand all to yourself!

We didn't take the trail back up, and instead walked up a steep paved access road closed off to the public, which resulted us walking through the neighborhood where we could view all the mansions and immaculate yards that overlooked the ocean.  We looked some of the houses up on Zillow and many of the homes are worth more than 10 million, some as much as 22 million!!!!  One had 12 bedrooms and 21 bathrooms!

Heading down to the tide pools

Jacob went down to this area to get close to the waves.  Every so often, a big wave came and got the entire area wet!  He managed to stay dry

After finding the hidden entrance between two homes, the Ho Chi Minh Trail opened up with the ocean down below

These white fluffy plumes were visible all along the top portion of the trail

They did not break off easily!

This was just one of the large homes along the edge of the cliff.  This one was like Ironman's house  all stainless steel and glass

The small "slot canyon" started getting bigger and bigger

This area looked like there was no way down, but there was!  Right in the middle of the crack. So many have walked down it, there are "steps" to help get down

Here is Meghan coming down, using the "steps"

Looking up what we just came down

We made it!!!  And it's beautiful and nobody is here!

Just lots of surfers and big waves!

All those dots in the water are surfers. We enjoyed watching them

This trail was quite an adventure and we loved it!