Palm Springs & Palm Desert -- Exciting Destinations

Palm Springs and Palm Desert, California, offer top resorts, sunshine, spas, glitz, glamour, golf, upscale shopping, nightclubs, tennis, great restaurants, horseback riding, mountains, the Follies Vaudeville Show, frivolity, fun, sunshine and outdoor activities. The hikable Mount San Jacinto and the San Gorgonio Mountains border these welcoming desert towns in Southern California’s unspoiled Coachella Valley.

These quiet towns were a getaway destination for Hollywood stars back in the days when contracts stipulated they could only travel within 100 miles of Hollywood. Many stars still live here. Since it’s just a two-hour drive east from Los Angeles, voila, these hot hideways became "hot."

My recent weeklong Palm Springs and Palm Desert vacation included desert drives; a stay at the Morongo Casino Resort and Spa Hotel, Cabazon, visits to the Palm Desert Living Zoo (dined with a leopard), the Wild Palms Reservation in Palm Springs; a whirling ride on the Palm Springs Aerial Tram (dizzifying at the 8500 foot top), a stay at the Morongo Casino Resort and Spa www.morongocasinoresort.com and a visit to its luxurious Sage Spa.

This region is now known as the world's golf capital. I learned why golf is so big here, going back to times when residents such as President Dwight D. Eisenhower and golf legend Arnold Palmer first popularized the sport to recent players like Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson. My week ended in Palm Desert at the elegant J.W. Marriott Hotel, 1-800-228-9290, www.marriott.com/hotels/travel/ctdca-desert-springs-a-jw-marriott-resort-and-spa-palm-desert, where I had a Spa facial by Amy; a gondola ride around the manmade lake; dinner at the gourmet Ristorante Tuscany, 1-760-341-1839, and tours of Palm Desert, bars and nightclubs.

On my tour around Palm Springs, friends and I passed by thousands of windmills providing electricity to the entire valley, waving like a challenge to Don Quixote should he gallop by. I took after a day at the Morongo Casino Hotel and Spa (I won on the slots, no kidding) at a Travel Media Showcase. The Morongo is in Cabazon, heading west in the desert valley about 20 minutes from Palm Springs and Palm Desert.

Set at the foot of the beautiful and San Jacinto Mountains, the Morongo Indian Reservation spans more than 32,000 acres and overlooks the vistas of the Banning Pass. We ate several meals here and the cooking was superb; The Vibe nightclub, off the casino floor, boasts a glitzy décor, dance floor and several tiers of balconies.

On my first sightseeing excursion, the tour theme was “Mountain High, Valley Low: Explore the Natural Wonders of Palm Springs” and it was a treat. This desert includes mountains! Our first stop was the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway, an exciting ride up Mount San Jacinto two-and-a-half miles to pristine wilderness on the world’s largest rotating tramcars. It was pretty weird as the floor revolved to give standees a 360-degree view. Where views from the top viewing platforms outside a lodge offered spectacular views across the valley and towns to the mountains on the other side. http://www.pstramway.com/. The Valley Station, Mountain Station and tramcars are handicap accessible. Adults $21.95, $14.95, Children. Meals served in the lodge; good gift shop.

Next we drove to the nearby Indian Canyons, owned and operated by the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians. These natural desert oases brim with undisturbed beauty and enormous, spring-fed Washingtonia Palm trees. At Andreas Canyon we took a short Ranger-led hike and learned about the time when local Indians called these canyons home.Hiker’s trails include the Palm Springs Indian Canyon Trails. Watch out for the snakes, roadrunners and other desert wildlife.

Before our Follies show, my group and I stopped at the modern Palm Springs Convention and Visitors Bureau for a gourmet dinner buffet catered by top local restaurants in Palm Springs (Kaiser Restaurant Group’s Kaiser Grills, Palm Springs; The Chop House, Palm Springs and Palm Desert; Crazy Bones, Palm Springs, and Carmel La Quinta, www.restaurnatsofpalmsprings.com, www.Hogsbreathinn.net. (Citron drink was my favorite). The food was superb and I hope to return to enjoy full course meals at the restaurants. Palm Springs is enjoying a mini-boom with at least a dozen new restaurants. PSP is also a gay friendly place.

After a dinner buffet, we boarded our tour bus for a short hop to see the Follies. Outside, diners were eating at patio tables; the streets were lively as the shops were open. This show starts at 6:30 p.m., as it is a favorite with the older crowd. The Palm Springs Follies is a blast; a three-hour mega-extravaganza of high kicks, singing, with a featured performance by the indomitable Kay Ballard (she’s great). “The Fabulous Palm Springs Follies is a world-famous, Broadway-caliber celebration of the music, dance, and comedy of the 30's and 40's, with a cast old enough to have lived it,” explains the website. Tin Pan Alley is the theme of this 17th edition playing May 17, 2008.

Elegant, urbane and witty Riff Markowitz is founder and impresario of this improbable reimagination of old-time Vaudeville and gracefully and humorously both introduces the numbers and performs some funny bits, including one with a “lucky” audience member. The show features performers over the age of 55, -- stars of Stage, Screen and Hollywood. The world’s oldest showgirl, at 84, did a tap dance number to the delight of the sold-house Plaza Theatre. These dynamos strutted, tapped, sang, performed, told jokes, and strutted down the stairs in the best Flo Ziegfieldesque showgirl costumes, compete with towering headdresses.

Remember the Ed Sullivan show, with dog, circus and operatic acts? He was recreating Vaudeville, to like the Follies. One of the audience’s favorite acts was Joanne Wilson's Wonder Dogs balancing, jumping from high stands and doing flips. The show plays to packed houses at every performance, up to ten shows a week, seven months a year. Www.psfollies.com.

Palm Springs Style author Robert Imber of PS Modern Tours led our van tour of the Mid-Century Modern architecture and modern art of Palm Springs, including anecdotes of stars; sculpture lining the main streets; heard some Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball stories, and passed exclusive country clubs, walked into the Racquet Ball Club and saw the famous pool where Marilyn Monroe was “discovered,” drove by gated and non-gated residences.

Ruth Ann Monroe, the City of Palm Desert Economic Development Manager, talked of preservation, during our lunch with a leopard at the Living Desert. (Bill Gates has an estate nearby, neatly hidden in the hills, per ordinance.)

Joshua Tree National Park’s Joshua Tree Resort is close by; to rent a private house there, from JTR, call 626-396-0903. For a getaway to the Lake District, contact Dan of Big Bear Lake, www.bigbear.com, 1-800-4-Big Bear about an hour away.

The 1200-acre Living Desert, Palm Desert,
Www.livingdesert.org offers views of critters that can live in desert environments and is boast natural habitats. A treasured memory -- I ate lunch with a leopard. Ok, I was eating; the leopard was relaxing on the ledge outside the thick Plexiglas barrier lining one wall of the Living Desert’s private dining room. It’s easy to walk around the on paved paths but an open-tram car is also available for a small charge. Several educational areas dot the grounds, too. We ambled around in the rain and because of the rain; our guide told us the animals were more active than usually. We saw the cougar, two wolves, blue frogs, a butterfly house, and a huge badger digging holes, two giraffes walking behind a ride; an ostrich, and the leopard. In the African wildlife exhibits are Arabian oryx, several species of gazelle, sand cats and fennec foxes. Bighorn Mountain features the endangered Peninsular Bighorn sheep. Located in Palm Desert and Indian Wells, a short drive from downtown Palm Springs Price: $7.50 - $11.50; under three, free.

For more information on Palm Springs, CA, contact the www.palm-springs.org, 800-927-7256. For Palm Desert, CA www.palm-desert.org, Palm Desert Visitor Center, (800) 873-2428