Destination: Palm Springs

Jeremy and I celebrated our 4^th wedding anniversary this weekend by taking a little road trip to Palm Springs. We headed to the land of mod with Mid Century Modern on our minds. And of course some pool time to cool off from the 100 degree temperatures.

It had been years since I had been to Palm Springs, and Jeremy’s first time. We had an easy drive for a Friday afternoon considering Southern California traffic. It just so happens that as you drive in to Palm Springs the first building you see is in the Mid Century Modern style, which I was pretty excited about. We returned to the Tramway Gas Station the next morning for our self guided tour map of Modern Palm Springs. The majority of the sites were residential homes, but there were other public buildings on the tour like fire stations, libraries, and hotels. We found a couple of shops selling modern décor, but I was really hoping for some great vintage desert shopping.

We took a few strolls downtown and were bummed the historical society was closed for the summer. That’s right, closed for the summer. They did have great vintage relics in their windows which made us want to know what treasures they might have inside.

Although we thoroughly enjoyed our time lounging in the pool and walking through town, we had a blast at the Tonga Hut, two days in a row. We stopped in for cocktails on Friday night and then returned Saturday for champagne brunch. We took advantage of the air conditioning in the upstairs lounge while enjoying fabulous rum cocktails. I was excited to find that they served Asian style “salsa and chips” of wantons and sweet and sour sauce and their fruit bowl served over ice.

On our drive home we took a detour to see the Cabazon Dinosaurs. As a kid I remember thinking how huge they were! Now that I’m all grown up, they are still big, but not as large as I remember them. It was fun to experience something from my childhood with Jeremy. The cherry on top was getting to climb to the top of the T-Rex together, which was something you couldn’t do when I was a kid.