I spent the night camped in the jeep in the Cove to Lake TH at the southeast end of La Quinta. I had checked all the signage to make sure there wasn't anything to restrict overnight camping. A bit surprising, but it seems this was totally legal, and fairly quiet after about 10p or so as most of the cars in the neighborhood have returned home. I was after a few stray peaks around La Quinta, before moving to a new area.
Ladies Peak
This modest-looking peak is found about a mile and half south of La Quinta at the head of the Bear Creek Wash. It looked easy enough on paper and as I started out from the TH where I'd slept. There are
numerous trails in the wash,
popular
for walking and biking, that can be used to approach the peak from either the
east or west side. I used the 
Boo Hoff Trail (the same I'd used the
previous day from its other end) to get within about 0.4mi on
the east side before leaving it to head cross-country up steep slopes.
As I was making my way up, 
a bighorn ewe spotted me, then
a second. They watched me as I returned the favor, but they eventually
decided 
to leave when it looked like I was getting a bit too close. I
reached the summit ridge, only to find the summit was still some ways off, with
some tough scrambling terrain between. 
Three other ewes caught sight of
me as I was descending around one pinnacle to a saddle, and pretty soon
I was 
seeing more of them 
all over the mountain, a few with
kids in tow. 
The ridge became class 3-4 as I found myself on
a knife-edged section with cliffs on both sides offering no easy
bypass. I spent about 20min on this 
final 1/10th mile stretch,
cautiously making my way along, wondering if I was going to find
myself cliffed-out. It seemed I'd picked a difficult route up the east side,
though in retrospect I'm not sure there's any easy way to this summit. It was
7:30a, an hour and a half after I'd started out, before I 
topped out
at the
now-impressive summit. This was undoubtedly the toughest peak I'd been to on
the entire roadtrip. Looking south and west, there appeared to be big cliffs
off those sides. The Northwest Ridge seemed to offer a tamer descent, but before
heading down, I 
left a register,
giving the peak a name for all the bighorn I
found on this peak, more than I'd ever seen in one place before. The NW Ridge
started off steep and loose, but manageable, at least until I got to where it
dropped off more precipitously. I had to scramble across
a class 3-4 section of sketchy rock before reaching a small notch. The
west side of this notch was dangerously steep, but
the east side offered an easy class 3 exit onto tamer
class 2 slopes.
There were another dozen sheep found on this side of the
mountain as well, though I didn't spot them until I was well below them on my
way down. I soon found my way to one of the many bike trails and then cruised
my way back 
to the start by 8:30a.
Peak 1,500ft
This summit is found immediately east of La Quinta. I could have started from the same spot, but chose to move the jeep about half a mile north to a closer starting location. The private Tradition Golf Course is a gated community that butts up against the mountain on this side, making access a little tricky. A quick study of the land usage in the area shows a corner of BLM lands just touching public Avenida Bermudas on the south side of the gated community. There is no fence along the road
at this corner,
and I was able to hike up and over a low rise to find my way to
the wash basin on the south side of the golf resort. I walked up a
concete 
flood control wash at the boundary between the two properties,
amused that an expensive-looking 
camera had been set up in the channel,
presumeably to watch for such riff-raff as myself. My ascent route went up a
decent subsidiary ridgeline to the southeast, most of it within the BLM lands
save for the very 
starting part. After 
a pleasant climb with
just a bit of 
class 3 scrambling, I reached 
the main crest
where a short hike to the north got me to 
the highpoint. Someone
had left a 16oz can of 
Miller Lite tucked under a rock. By the faded
paint on the can, I could tell that it was quite old. I left it back where I
found it for some future, more adventurous person to sample. I then
continued north a short distance to Pt. 1,482ft where
a wooden cross with a couple of flags can be found. Why the
Swedish flag? Good question, but no obvious answer to be found. I decided to
descend 
the ridge directly west down from this point. The whole ridge
appears
to be outside the BLM lands and dumps one off at the bottom on the gated
community's property. I figured at this point the worst they would do would be
to kick me out, so I wasn't much worried about it. It made for an enjoyable
descent, taking about 45min, and nobody bothered with me. I went back across
the concrete wash at the south end, back on BLM property, then exited back to
Aveneda Bermudas via a slightly different route, flatter and easier than the
way in, but goes through 
DWA property for a short stretch before
returning to the public thoroughfare.
Done by 11:30a, I had thought I would do the remaining two peaks that I'd skipped the previous day, but by now I had had enough of the bouldery scrambling and was looking for something more tame. I would leave La Quinta BM and its neighbor for another time.
Cahuilla Peak/Murray Hill/Peak 2,085ft
Looking for something easier, I decided to head northwest and the south end of Palm Springs. A patchwork of BLM and Indian lands is found in the hills on either side of Palm Canyon. There is a whole network of good trails on the east side of the canyon built over the past four decades, lovingly maintained by volunteers. I found a GPS track on PB by Mihai Giurgiulescu that I used, starting at
the Garstin TH
located at the end of Barona Rd. My primary goal
was Murray Hill with almost 600ft of prominence, but the track also took in a
PB-only summit, Cahuilla Peak. The trail network is very popular and I found
dozens of folks along it on a Thursday afternoon. It took about 40min to find
my way to 
Cahuilla Peak where a pair of retirees were engaged in
conversation while taking in the views 
north to Palm Springs.
Looking east, I could see several trails wandering off over hill and dale, part
of the network in the area, including one I could use to continue on to
Murray Hill without having to backtrack as was done on the GPS track.
This connected me to the Wildhorse Trail which climbs up from a saddle
along a ridgeline with several switchbacks. After reaching Pt. 1,770ft,
the grade eases, continuing south to 
a trail junction at a saddle. The
Wildhorse Trail continues downhill to the south while the Clara Burgess Trail
goes west to Murray Hill. Reaching the summit around 2:15p, I found three
picnic benches just below the summit and 
a small memorial with
a poem to a lost loved one. It was pretty warm today, much like the previous
day, but 
the views were less hazy. After spending about 20min at the
summit, I returned to the last trail junction where I turned south to head for
a last summit, 
Peak 2,085ft. This one lies just inside Indian lands,
but there are no fences or signs to delineate the boundary along the way. There
is also no trail going to this summit, so a bit of cross-country travel is
needed. I left the Wildhorse Trail where it wanders through
a sandy wash, about half a
mile northeast of Peak 2,085ft. I then contoured around the southeast ridge of
Pt. 2,055ft, aiming for the northeast slopes of Peak 2,085ft. The going here
isn't so bad as there is much less of the boulder-strewn slopes I'd dealt with
earlier in the La Quinta area. The slopes to the summit are steep but good
footing, all class 2. I reached the summit around 3:20p, leaving
a new register
where I'd found none. I had several options for the return, the most
straightforward being to return the way I came. I could also have shortcutted
that route by going north, over Pt. 2,055ft to return to the Wildhorse Trail
above the trail junction. A third option, which seemed more sporting and
possibly faster, was to 
head northwest,
cross-country to one of the other
trailheads in the neighborhood. It was this last option I went with. The
northwest side
of Peak 2,085ft is quite a bit steeper than the northeast side,
requiring some care in dropping the first 600ft. After that, the going gets
quite a bit easier, with some minor uphill sections as I did some contouring
across some drainages to get to a low saddle on the west side of Pt. 2,055ft.
More downhill ensued as I followed the drainage to a wash that emptied
out into 
the southeast end of the neighborhood. Unfortunately a dry
waterfall is encountered near the very end, making that way more difficult. I
spied a few hikers above me to the north and figured that was where I wanted to
get, so with a bit of uphill climbing I landed on 
one of the trails
that very quickly got me to the 
Frank Bogert TH. From there, it was
another mile of hiking along dirt and paved roads through
the neighborhood to get me 
back to the other TH
where I'd started. It was less than 45min from the summit of Peak 2,085ft to
the car, so I think I was a bit lucky in finding the fastest (and most fun)
route back, finishing up at 4:45p. That would do it for the day, so I went off
to find a place to shower, dinner in town somewhere, and then later someplace
to spend the night. A good day overall...
Continued...