Nov 01, 2016 The Painted Canyon of Mecca
My family and I attended a wedding in Indian Wells last weekend. It was lovely and it was also a great excuse to check out the desert since we don’t drive out to the desert very often. It was also good timing because it wouldn’t be too hot this time of year.
There’s Salton Sea, Anzo Borrega, and Josua Tree nearby but I chose the Painted Canyon as our destination because a friend showed me amazing pictures and the ladders seemed like they would be fun for an 8-year-old kid.
After driving down five miles of a sometimes rutted, bumpy, and deep dirt road–being in a car with four-wheel drive helped a lot–you park in front of rock structures and walk up a canyon to a fork. At first we took the path on the left but turned back because we didn’t want my in-laws climbing over huge boulders. So we went right.
After walking though a corridor that would make the Wile E. Coyote and Roadrunner jealous, we found the marker that points toward a hike entrance obscured by piles of boulders that seem to have fallen in an earthquake. There’s an obvious but crooked path leading over the boulders that leads to a ladder that you can climb down into a narrow channel that was dug out by water.
There are a few of these ladders with various levels of sketchiness in the corridor. We left my in-laws at this point, but at least there were plenty of rocks to sit on and cliffs providing shade. Yes, we brought bottles with water and so should you.
The slot path mostly ranges between three and five feet across, with surfaces on either side smoothed by water. I’m a terrible judge of heights but we seemed to be two or three stories below the surface. You don’t want to be here during a flash flood.
Besides ladders, there was some other evidence of humans: spray painted graffiti, discarded light sabers. I could see how people could have fun with either in a fantastic environment like this but come on.
When the subterranean path emerged into a larger canyon after 20-30 minutes of jaw-dropping scenery, we turned back to meet my in-laws. The hike was an amazing experience that we might have shared with cave dwelling ancestors, but it was time to go back to the car and find someplace to have lunch and use the bathroom.
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