school me-painted canyon and box canyon

[ronin-0707]

hey, my church is heading out to painted canyon and box canyon this weekend in mecca by palm springs. does anyone know if there are hiking trails, points of interests there?
is it family/kid friendly for hikes?
any maps of the area? internet sites regarding the area? places to stop off first?

any input. pics? would be great.
thanks!

 

[bpenn1980]

I dont know the name of it, but just outside of Mecca is an awesome slot canyon you can hike up. There's a rickety old wooden ladder (at least in 2001) in a couple place, but its pretty cool and you can drive almost to the entrance.

Yep, just looked on a map, its at the end of Painted Canyon Rd. Pretty cool.

You drive over the San Andreas Fault on Box Canyon Road and Painted Canyon Road, could be fun to tell the kids about that too.

Salton Sea has some cool history/stories. Stories of a Spanish Treasure Galleon sailing up the now dry Colorado River from the Cortez Sea and getting stranded in the Salton Sea.... good stuff. I can guarantee the kiddies will take a renewed interest in exploring the area!

 

[ronin-0707]

hey thanks for the response
do you think 4-5y/o's could manage that ladder?

 

[bpenn1980]

Sure, two adults, one at the top, one at the bottom. I'd give it a shot and see how the canyon looks when you're in it since its not a far walk from the truck. Heavy rain fall like we got this winter tends to change the face of things though. Could make it easier, could be harder.

 

[SOCALFJ]

We were there on Thanksgiving, but we didn't hike. We were in search of a old campsite that we used to head to 20+ years ago. I luckily found it, but its now shut down by the BLM. We camped in Painted/Box canyon for the first nights leg of Bradshaw overland route.

here are some pics of the area.. We camped about halfway up the canyon. At the end of the canyon there were tons of hikers.

Entering Painted Canyon Road.


The area we used to camp. Now it's closed by BLM.


it's not hard to find, as you can tell in this pic.... street sign


No real great spots to camp. Mostly day users. But we needed to camp somewhere this night so we could start the trail in the morning. Beautiful canyon.


The turkey we cooked

 

[ronin-0707]

hey socalfj
great pics of the area
how far is that from la quinta area?

 

[SOCALFJ]

25 minutes maybe?

Painted Canyon, Mecca Hills, California

 

[ronin-0707]

bpenn and socalfj
thanks for all the info
we brought a small group out to painted/box canyon and they had fun
my 7y/o loved it and the 4.5y/o was fearless

missed my fzj80, but the road wasn't too bad for the volvo stationwagon
work was started on the fzj80 on sunday so maybe in a week or so I should get it back!

 

[ronin-0707]

headgasket is fixed!

hg fixed and here are some pixs of painted canyon
so finally got around to reading the faq on attaching pics

 

[bpenn1980]

hg fixed and here are some pixs of painted canyon
so finally got around to reading the faq on attaching pics

Good deal, how'd the kiddies do in the slot canyon? No problems with the ladders (if they're even still there)?

 

[ronin-0707]

ladders were there and the kids took it as a challenge.
we all enjoyed ourselves!

 

[SOCALFJ]

Right on! Great pics, thanks for sharing.