A few hours in Palm Springs--mountaintop and Marilyn...

Last weekend found us in southern California for a quick trip...

...on the way back to Tucson, we decided to get off I-10 and spend a few hours in Palm Springs.

The giant windmills beneath San Gorgonio Mountain are surreal...

...then heading up into Chino Canyon...

...to take the Swiss-built rotating aerial-tram up to the snowy and forested Mt. San Jacinto wilderness...

From the lodge at the top, a view over the Desert Cities over and across the San Andreas Fault to the low mountains of Joshua Tree National Park...

The contrast between the barren desert floor and the wintry evergreens at the stop is striking; the magic of elevation-and-climate in the desert...

Back down in Palm Springs--

downtown at the corner of Palm Canyon Drive and Tahquitz Canyon Way:

Twenty-six feet tall, seventeen tons of steel, aluminum and paint--"Forever Marilyn" by artist Seward Johnson, inspired by this famous photo from the film "The Seven Year Itch."

...and I couldn't resist this shot--the triangle of the toddler, reclining guy positioned just so, and the statue's (whimsical? voyeuristic?) backside: the toddler (whose face I've respectfully blurred) seemed to be staring at the guy lying on the lawn, accusing him: "really, dude? You're napping right there, staring at the statue? Kinda creepy..."

Incidentally, the new issue of The Atlantic has an insightful essay on Marilyn Monroe's celebrity-hood... 

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...and back home in Tucson--
looking over Bear Canyon, on a trail run the other evening: 

 
After last week's snow--back up to 80-degrees now in Southern Arizona...