JTNP / DVNP / Vegas Spring 2026

We did a day in Joshua Tree and a day in Death Valley before heading to Las Vegas this trip. Having never been to either I can say our impression of JTNP was meh but we were pleasantly surprised by DVNP.

The issue with JTNP was two fold. First, I changed my mind at 3am before hoping in car to airport to wear black shit kicker boots instead of my tried and true hiking boots. why? Because they matched my outfit. ugh. Started getting blisters because my feet were sliding around in them not wearing thick winter socks. By the time we hiked the Arch Rock/ Heart Rock trail I had four blister, one on each heel they size of a lime and one on each top covering from big toe to almost pinkie toe. So in other words, all but my toes and the center of my foot. I couldn't walk anymore after just 2 of six miles in. So we just went to viewpoints afterward. Secondly everything looks the same. Rocks and Joshua trees. We like more variety in our parks. Mountains, valleys, waterfalls, Spires, look this way WOW! Look that way OMG! IDK, it just didn't seem as grand or WOW packed as other parks. So after only 4 hrs we were fine to leave. a disappointing dinner followed. Not the restaurants fault, I just made poor choices.

Awoke really early so we headed out towards Death Valley over an hour before sunrise. First hour on the road we only saw maybe 5 cars bu the time we stopped at iconic Rt 66 Roy's Cafe for a smoke break at day break. Drove to Baker before stopping again for more coffee and bathroom where we encountered signs saying "special event, expect delays" on the road between Baker and Shashone. Stopped in Shashone for breakfast (great stop) and asked waitress what was going on? (Though clearly a race as port-o-johns and water stations every 10 miles or so made that evident) She said annual Baker to Vegas Relay. 120 miles run by teams of Law Enforcement. 🤯 We got ahead of it 30 mins before start apparently. It takes them all day and overnight!

Arriving into DVNP and around a curve - there was the super bloom I had been hoping for! A sea of yellow. What a sight! went around another bend and it looked as if people were walking on water (wish I had a picture). As it was people out in Lake Manly. We stopped, walked about 15 mins out to waters edge. Did a few more views; Devils golf course, artists pallete etc but my feet were still a disaster and it was now over 100 degrees (before noon last weekend in March!) so we headed to The Inn for drinks. Beautiful but pretentious AF.

Then over to The Ranch to check in and grab a nap. Back out and over to Inn for dinner followed by cocktails at Ranch's Last Kind Word Saloon. Night sky viewing from our rooms patio and off to sleep.

Awoke with enough time to catch sunrise at Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes and hit Zabriskie point before we headed off to Vegas, happy to have visited DVNP.

We got to Vegas, dropped off car and in Paris at 1030am Sunday. Shockingly Paris already had our room. Just a regular Burgundy King in main tower this time (Mr Juice has new host so a little disappointed no suite this time but it's fine). We each had our biggest wins of the trip in the first day, each just over $1300. We were pleased with new handpay limits meaning no taxes removed. Mine was on Buffalo Chief Platinum in Paris, Mr Juice's was in Cosmo on a Buffalo Revolution. Lunch at Beer Park. Dinner going to bed was grabbing Bobby's and eating half the burger & fries saving the other half. Table games were unkind this trip, but at least $5 Miss stud Sun/Mon/Tues. We only played $10 once on Wednesday before giving up. Only twice did we have time at them, others it was a fairly steady draining of our buy in. Once Mr Juice left table up ever so slightly in time it took me to lose $200.

We stayed hopping between PH, Cosmo, Bellagio, Horseshoe & Paris everyday except Tuesday when we did north end; RW, Encore/Wynn and southward. Some decent wins here and there between everywhere so that we didn't have any huge losing days but nothing as big as that first day. The funnys of the trip...on Monday after two or three Mimosas Mr Juice got me laughing so hard after an unlady like burp escaped my lips at the Cosmo and his jokes mocking me that I started crying I was laughing so much. But I think Cosmo only saw the aftermath of me wiping my eyes from crying that a slot attendant came over asking if I was OK all compassionate and caring looking. So then I was giving him a hard time they think he mistreats me.

Second funny was Tuesday morning. I came down in khaki capris at 6am and was playing a game when a security guard came over and was looking at me kind of funny. He then told me my pants blended with my skin color enough on camera that they thought I wasn't wearing pants! And he was sent to check it out. What?! LOL, that's a first! I thought I looked nice that day. Told him it's a hazard I guess for pasty white chicks. As a midwest girl coming out of winter, my skins is the color of uncooked chicken. So then we made jokes the rest of the trip about me Winnie the Poohing around the casino in my shirt no pants combo. Only meals of note were lunch per usual at Delmonico for the lobster bisque on Tuesday and dinner at Cheri Rooftop at Paris. I fear this will close soon as it didn't appear crowded at all and they text me an hour before reservation time saying our table was ready. We walked over to make sure there wasn't an issue with the reservation timing and her response was "no, we're just bored so thought if you wanted to eat early we'd let you know you could." And it turns out it's not one for my celebration dinner so oh well, we'll have to have two meals in October to use both Mr Juice & mine.

Final observations, there were so many families this trip with young kids for Spring Break. And I'm talking a bunch of under 10 yr olds out at 1130pm. Was a bit annoying as they were a lot being told to get out of casino area as parents played slots. Paris had about 25% of slots off changing them out Mon-Wed which was annoying during a 5x week but we did get to play new games Thursday before we left. We left town with about one day (20%) of gambling budget and each close or made Diamond Plus again. Town felt down still (aka 2025 levels, not 2023 busy but not dead). But after being in severe pain on October trip from needing (unbeknownst to me) urgent spinal surgery it was nice to have this trip where my biggest pain was blisters from hiking. When I went into my ACDF spinal surgery in November I was unsure if life would be "normal" afterwards. This was blissfully normal, and I wouldn't want it any other way.