Joshua Tree has lots of cool piles of rocks and because you don’t have to stay on trail you can pull over almost anywhere and explore them. It’s a wonderful playground for kids because there were so many places they could run around and thankfully the rattlesnakes only come out in the spring and summer here. But if random rocks aren’t your thing there are some great “named” rocks for you to see and we saw them all.

The easiest named rock is called Skull Rock and is right off the main road through the park. There is lots of parking there and almost always a crowd, but its worth a quick jump out to see it.

Split Rock is another picnic area that also has a two mile hike from the spot. Of all the hikes we did this was by far the hardest with poorly marked trails and really difficult footing in some places. I actually left the trail towards the end and went straight across to the parking lot because I was just done in. Personally not a fan of any trail where I spent more time watching my footing than looking around and that was definitely the case for me on this one.

By far my favorite hike was Arch Rock. Not only does this lead to a super cool arch it also leads to Heart Rock as well which was amazing. Deb and Steve visited there a couple of years ago and she told me about it, but then it was not on a trail and you had to find it. Thankfully when we went they extended the trail to heart rock and it was pretty easy to find because other people were standing there. The path itself is a little confusing because the parking area is on the wrong side of the road, but the trail itself was well marked and easy to walk. I loved it and it was one of my favorite hikes ever.

After seeing heart rock we wandered back towards the Arch which was a little hard to find. Listen for the voices and look for the people though and you’ll get there. I actually climbed up some pretty big rocks to get to the top and crazy Lee went all the way up above it. Very cool place and the people were super nice with everyone taking turns taking pictures of each other.