Fun discovery in Borrego Springs area

Lary's hunt for a base for his bird carving led us to Borrego Springs, CA, a journey of 2 hours south toward the Mexican border. 

Borrego Springs is in Anza Borrego Desert State Park, a huge park that runs from Palm Desert near Palm Springs, almost down to the border with Mexico.  Its 630,000 acres, quite mountainous in places, is described as a valuable plant, animal, geologic and cultural resource.  One of the largest herds of endangered Bighorn Sheep in the US make it home, and in eras gone past it had a rich animal life too.  In prehistoric times it was a lake in some areas.

Borrego Springs view - and the explorer Juan Bautista de Anza

Lary's previous carving teacher Vern had steered Lary to a man down there, Rich at Manzanita Burlwoods, who uses manzanita roots and wood to make bases for many decorative items, so off we headed to stay overnight, meet him and get a base for the bluejay carving.  That was mission 1, and we found him immediately, and waded through his shop looking for the perfect base.  We found a lovely one, he varnishes the wood, it's very hard already, and we bought it.

Then off to discover more things, as we had seen huge iron sculptures all along the highway on our route Hwy 78 into town, wondering about them, who had done them, and why they were there. 

Turns out that the sculptor who created them is Ricardo Breceda of Perris, California, and the land they are situated on is called Galleta Meadows, owned by Dennis Avery, a benefactor who has allowed the huge oversized iron sculptures to be situated on his land.  Avery has several pieces of land, not all joined together, and the massive works of art and whimsy are there on his various acreages.  Most of them can be found using a very good brochure that the town of 3,000 or so produces to guide you.  Most of them are easily accessible from Borrego Springs Road, north and south, and there are places to park nearby, wander around and explore the free standing sculptures.

Ricardo has three different themes in his work, many of them are based on fossils from prehistoric eras when creatures roamed the valley millions of years ago, then there are some historical figures like Juan Bautista de Anza, the Mexican explorer who led an expedition through this area to San Francisco in the late 1700s, and there is a third more contemporary theme of the field workers who picked grapes in this area, and who were involved in the historic United Farm Workers boycott in the late 1960s.

Most of my photos were of the prehistoric animals, as I ran out of battery on my camera after that, very frustrating.  I luckily caught the one of the explorer de Anza which is located at the Chamber of Commerce, but I ran out of battery for the last ones, those of huge prehistoric tortoises, camels, tapirs and peccories, and then the Willys Jeep from the 1950s.

It was a lovely overnight expedition for us, a pretty scenic desert mountainous area, which we enjoyed thoroughly and would love to visit again, perhaps next year once Lary has his next carving project ready to mount.

Borrego Springs, a very small town, swells during the winter, snowbirds love its clear mountain air, its artistic feel, and the many winter events largely oriented toward a very artistic leaning community of people.  There are RV parks in and around the town, a few nice hotels, and there are pretty galleries, stores and events planned throughout the winter season, and of course there is lots of hiking and outdoor activity in the nearby Anza Borrego State Park for nature lovers of all kinds.

Lary and I visited the informative visitors center there in the park, it was well laid out with a lot of good material for purchase, and several movies of the park and its differing interests and charms.