In which Layla and Roz pretend to be 1950s filmstars and hike in canyons

by Layla

We had decided to holiday in Palm Springs principally because I had a conference near there. TEDMED was scheduled Wednesday to Friday, so I flew to Los Angeles, caught a bus, train, bus and car, then spent three days ensconced in the fancy La Quinta resort with hundreds of health and healthcare innovators all of whom marvelled at my public transport methods of getting to Palm Springs. Then after all that learning, I got a car to downtown Palm Springs where I found Roz just off the plane (and bus and train and bus) and gleefully we leapt into the hotel swimming pool: our holiday had started!

By random chance, our good friends from Washington were visiting Palm Springs that day so no sooner had we got out of the pool, we were being conveyed to their friend’s house for cocktails. We were quite thrilled to find that this was no ordinary house but an amazing mid-century modern house by the same architect who designed one of Frank Sinatra’s houses. It felt exactly like being a 1950s film star. As we were driven back to a restaurant afterwards we marvelled at the amazing architecture in Palm Springs, surrounded by soaring desert hills. This town had style. Also great restaurants. We had a delicious meal, marred only briefly by the embarrassment of our British credit cards not working! Luckily we did not have to wash the dishes and got it all sorted out. What a fabulous first evening.

The next day we jumped in the hotel’s swimming pool and hot tub again: the most appropriate way to start any day. Then, after a tedious episode hunting down a US SIM card for our phone atop bikes, we headed downtown, acquiring coffee and cake at the cool coffeeshop Koffi, a smoothie, and two picnic sandwiches along the way. Forty five minutes of walking brought us to the visitors’ centre for Tahquitz Canyon. We enjoyed our sandwiches at a nice picnic table, and then headed into the canyon for a hike. And it was amazing: such incredible views, colours, and scenery. And much less uphill than the slightly over-vigorous website led me to fear.  A perfect little hike. We Ubered back to the coffeeshop and sat in their charming garden before fighting the crowds to get back to the hotel. Tonight was Palm Springs’ famous parade of lights, and the main road was lined with people perched in anticipation upon camp chairs on both sides. We put on warmer clothes then headed out again for a delicious dinner at Trio punctuated with popping out onto their balcony to see the parade: lots of high school marching bands and dance teams, the mayor, Santa on a fire engine, giant inflatable Christmas tree ornaments… It was massive. After dinner we walked alongside the parade and then far, far (we couldn’t make our phone data work so couldn’t call an Uber) to this beautiful little old cinema called Camelot Theatre, where we watched Loving, before sweet talking the cinema manager into giving us his wifi password so we could call an Uber home.

After the requisite swim and hot tub, the next day was to be another hiking day. So once we fixed our phone data, found a shop that sold sun lotion and bought picnic quiches in Koffi, we hopped in an Uber, destination: Indian Canyons. It all sounded most romantic and sure enough it was. Our hike there was perhaps one of the most perfect we have ever done. Americans, why did you never tell us about the amazing hiking in Palm Springs? We walked to Palm Canyon and to Andreas Canyon (less far than the combination of canyons might suggest) They were genuinely spectacular. And the weather was perfect. Such a delightful day.

We had a post-hike swim, then glammed up and headed out to the Purple Room for some famous dinner theatre. It was The Judy Show, a drag show that we found quite painfully bad. It was clearly the preferred venue for all the heterosexual couples of Palm Springs (who appeared to make up a distinct minority) but wasn’t really for us. However the food was excellent. Afterwards we had a bedtime beer in Cheeky’s. Another excellent Palm Springs day.

This morning the weather was a bit too chilly to swim so we substituted our daily swim with a ridiculous episode of me getting some weirdly painful shampoo in my eye. Then we got yet another Uber, this time to the Tramway, a very cool rotating cablecar that takes you soaring up to Mt San Jacinto State Park. We’d been warned it was much colder up there than in the desert but it was still a bit weird to be suddenly greeted by an alpine scene of fir trees covered in snow! Especially as I was wearing sandals… Undeterred, we slipped and slid our way around a really beautiful two-mile snowy hiking trail, then had lunch at the restaurant which had more spectacular views. Palm Springs has been a revelation: such an amazing mix of modernism, hiking, eating, gay people, style and fabulous scenery. We both fell in love with it and are coveting a return visit for its international film festival… but for now we have waved farewell and are zooming west on a bus – as that’s the kind of classy people we are. Next stop: Los Angeles!