This weekend after a nice hike in 70 degree weather, I came home and turned on the TV to watch the news. Much of the Northeast was digging out of a blizzard, northern California and the Pacific Northwest was dealing with rain and flooding, and other parts of the country were also suffering from crappy weather.

If you live in one of these places and the weather negatively impacted you or you are just feeling down because of weather crapola, here is a small antidote.

I live in a large valley named the Coachella Valley. In some of our canyons there are palm oases where native Washingtonia Palm trees grow. There are several of these oases in the eastern part of our valley. These palms need a lot of water, which is supplied by undergrounds springs created by the San Andreas Earthquake fault.

Here are a few pictures from my hike to cheer you up.

Above: View of Mt. San Gorgonio in the San Bernardino Mountains. Yes, we have snow… only we have the option to visit the snow and then leave when we tire of it.

Above: View of Mt. San Jacinto in the San Jacinto Mountains.

Above: As new fronds grow at the top of the palm, the old ones wither and die creating these wonderful skirts on the trunk.

Above: Palms can withstand fire, which removes the dead frond skirts from the bottom.

Above: The ground here is saturated with surface water from the spring.