You may be familiar with the large marble Chinese Guardian Lion statues between Route 66 and Kelbaker Road but did you know Amboy may have once had its very own living African lion? “Old Man Miller,” as he was known in the Amboy area, was the first person to spot a large African lion near…
We originally referenced 100 of our favorite desert books five years ago. We still enjoy browsing museum gift shops and used book stores for nuggets of gold in the form of guidebooks, nature guides and history books. Discovering obscure out-of-print books is extra fun. Many new books have been published recently that also deserve our…
How many have driven by this older building with a bright green extraterrestrial on its door, located on Old Woman Springs Road in Lucerne Valley without knowing the startling history of the former mild-mannered owner with a French accent? Do they know an author of five books sat in the corner of the store, then…
On March 2, 2023, we woke to the appearance of a tiny visitor, just outside our front door. This girl has set up nesting duties in our Ocotillo in a pot near our front entrance. The Trochilidae family includes the world’s smallest birds, with the most brilliant iridescent colors, the fastest wingbeats, and the most amazing…
Cafes and rooming houses in Daggett sprang up. These were used as meeting places for business, as well as entertainment. One of the more popular joints was known as “Ma Preston’s”…
We get asked quite often, “How do you find all the places you write about?” Here’s our secret. It’s all about guidebooks. Some armchair experts may try to tell you how challenging it is to get to a particular site, but if you have the right information about how to get there and what to…
One of our hobbies we enjoy is browsing museum gift shops and used bookstores for nuggets of information in the form of small books and pamphlets. Some are out-of-print so discovering these treasures is extra fun. As you can imagine, we have collected quite a few desert-related books over the years. If anything good can…
We had an amazing adventure exploring lovely Afton Canyon. The Mojave River flows above ground here and ranges from a small creek to a couple of feet deep depending on seasonal rainfall totals. Afton Canyon lies in part along the old Mojave Indian Trail, near the 35th parallel, that extended from the Colorado River to…
Cronese vs. Coronise Figuring out the origin of the Cronese Cat’s name has just about as many theories as a storybook feline has lives. It was believed the natural wonder is either named for early explorer and author Titus Fey Cronise or William H.V. Cronise. In 1870, both were officers of the Piute Mining Company….
Greetings from Camp Cady, California! Armistice Day (later to be named Veterans Day) is still about 60 years away, but here we are, taking you back in time to the loneliest, meanest U.S. Army outpost in the United States, a year before the Civil War went hot. It is a day in 1860, and we’re…