Pudgy Buffalo

Quick Look

Distance: .12-mile loop, very easy

A leisurely stroll along a mountain crest offers visitors stunning Southern California panoramas and an exceptional opportunity to experience the powerful forces of nature at work at long-standing park favorite, Keys View. A very easy .12-mile (.2 km) path gently loops around the beautiful vista point, making this much-lauded “Best View in the Park” a great place for travelers of all ages to stretch their legs while drinking in the sights. The picturesque overlook, with its glowing mountains at sundown, is also a spectacular place to savor the light and color of the desert. Informative signs along the loop spotlight Southern California’s incredible geography, modern enterprise, and environmental challenges.

Explore It

Keys View sits high atop a ridge in the Little San Bernardino Mountains, making it an excellent place to get acquainted with the vast Southern California landscape. With an elevation of 5,185 feet (1580 m), Keys View is truly one of the park’s top spots. (Quail Mountain, just to the northeast, is the park’s highest peak at 5,816 feet / 1772 m.) The Little San Bernardino Mountains, sprawling across the southwestern boundary of Joshua Tree National Park, and stretching from the Coachella Valley to the Salton Sea, ride the border between the Mojave Desert to the north and the Colorado Desert to the south.

As you loop around the crest at Keys View, savor its mountain-meets-desert setting. To the northwest, see sweeping vistas of San Gorgonio Mountain, which at 11,503 feet (3506 m), is the tallest peak in Southern California. To the west, find the seasonally snow-capped Mount San Jacinto, a favorite mountain playground; as well as the emerald-green golf courses of Palm Springs. Indio, home of the celebrity-flush Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, basks in the sun of the Colorado Desert to the south. Beyond the Coachella Valley, look for the glimmering receding waters of the Salton Sea, and on days clear of haze, try to spot Signal Mountain (El Centinela) popping up all the way from Mexico.

Gazing down from the slopes of the Little San Bernadino Mountains, keep an eye out for majestic bighorn sheep taking shelter from predators in the steep, rocky mountainside. An infamous geological feature also lurks in the valley below, a powerful natural force that has the potential to wreak great havoc on creatures big and small—the San Andreas Fault (see entry #120).

Spend some time at Keys View taking in the Southern California vistas that have delighted visitors for generations.