A World of Cactuses and Mining

California’s best underground hike is through the two main caves in Mitchell Caverns State Reserve. Ranger-led walks through the dramatic limestone caves offer a fascinating geology lesson, one the whole family can enjoy.

After exploring the great indoors, allow some time to investigate the area’s intriguing above-ground trails. The caverns are part of Providence Mountains State Recreation Area, a 5,900-acre island of state parkland surrounded by the 1.6-million-acre Mojave National Preserve.

A trio of park trails offer an excellent introduction to the Providence Mountains, one of the dominant ranges in the eastern Mojave Desert.

Experience the grandeur and isolation of the mountains by hiking the short (one-half mile round trip) Nin~a Mora Trail. The path ascends the summit of one of a pair of hills known as Camel Humps.

From atop the hump, gaze out over about 300 square miles of desert. Clear-day views include Arizona’s Hualapai Mountains, about 100 miles to the east.

The trail was named for little Mora, daughter of a Mexican silver miner who toiled in the region’s diggings in the early 1900s. A miner’s life--as well as that of his family members--was often a short one. And so it was with Mora, who died in childhood and lies buried in a grave near the trail.

From the campground, the path leads over a barrel cactus- and yucca-dotted ridge, and past the grave marker of nin~a Mora. In no time you reach trail’s end and a view over the weathered rhyolite crags of the Providence Mountains looming to the west. Below is Clipper Valley, and to the east is Table Mountain.

Access: Join the signed path at the east end of the park’s tiny campground.

Crystal Spring: Crystal Spring Trail (two miles round trip with a 600-foot elevation gain) leads into the pin~on pine- and juniper-dotted Providence Mountains by way of Crystal Canyon. Bighorn sheep often travel through this canyon.

Crystal Canyon is walled with limestone and rhyolite, a red volcanic rock. High above, castle-like formations of this rhyolite crown the Providence Mountains.

The steep and rather rocky trail offers both an exploration of an inviting high desert canyon and engaging vistas of the spires of Providence Mountains peaks.

In less than a one-quarter-mile ascent, hikers enter a unique desert landscape framed by bold rhyolite outcrops. Pin~on pines join a veritable garden of barrel, cholla and prickly pear cactuses.

About half a mile out, keen-eyed hikers may spy the pipeline Jack Mitchell built in the 1930s to supply his tourist attraction in-the-making (the caverns). The path crosses to the canyon’s right side and continues a last one-quarter mile to the end of the trail, just short of willow-screened Crystal Spring. Intrepid hikers may proceed on a fainter trail to the spring and on to a viewpoint a short distance farther.

Access: Join the signed trail ascending the slope near the start of the Mitchell Caverns Trail.

Mary Beal Nature Study Trail: Pick up an interpretive booklet from the park visitor center and walk the Mary Beal Nature Trail (half a mile round trip), which offers a great introduction to high desert flora. Cliff rose and blue sage share the hillsides with cholla, cat claw and creosote.

The trail honors Mary Beal, a Riverside librarian who was “exiled” to the desert by her doctor for health reasons. For half a century this remarkable woman wandered through the Providence Mountains and other remote Mojave Desert locales gathering and classifying hundreds of varieties of plants. The trail was dedicated in 1952 on Beal’s 75th birthday.

The path meanders an alluvial plain. Prickly pear, cholla and assorted yuccas spike surrounding slopes. Benches offer restful places from which to contemplate the cactuses, admire the volcanic boulders and count the roadrunners.

Access: Walk the road north of the visitor center to the trail head.

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Nina Mora, Crystal Spring, Mary Beal Trails

WHERE: Providence Mountains State Recreation Area/Mithcell Caverns State Reserve.

DISTANCE: Various one-half to 2-mile round trip trails

TERRAIN: Craggy peaks and inviting canyons of eastern Mojave Desert.

HIGHLIGHTS: Red rock formations, cactus gardens.

DEGREE OF DIFFICULTY: Easy

FOR MORE INFORMATION: Providence Mountains State Recreation Area, P.O. Box 1, Essex, CA 92332; tel. (760) 928-2586