Skull Rock Nature Trail in Joshua Tree National Park is a 1.7 mile loop which contains one of the popular rock formations named Skull Rock. The beginning of the trail is located across from Jumbo Rocks Campground and is rated as an easy trail.
Skull Rock Nature Trail
This formation marks the beginning of the trail and is easy to identify from the road. It is a very popular hike in the park and you are likely to have more trouble finding parking than finding the trail. We were able to park in the campground because almost all of the sites were vacant. This was definitely the most populated hike that we took during our visit.
Skull Rock Nature Trail
There were a lot of cool looking formations on the trail. It took us 22 minutes to make it to Skull Rock. It’s impossible to miss. The ‘eye sockets’ are caused by erosion from rain.
Skull Rock in Joshua Tree National Park
I think it’s fitting that my closest encounter with death (while in the park) came at Skull Rock. I was enjoying a lovely conversation with a fellow photographer as we were taking turns getting different angles of the rock when he suddenly stopped, looked horrified, and said, “DON’T MOVE!” I immediately froze, my heart pounding. My husband whirled around to see what was going on. As I was standing as still as a statue I noticed everyone else was backing away from me, like I was carrying the plague. My fellow photographer said to my husband, “You’ve got to get that off of her.” I decided to look down to see what was freaking everyone out and saw the biggest stinging insect I’ve ever seen in my life. It was the size of my palm, sitting on my thigh. My husband took off his hat and started moving towards me, while the other photographer said, “Good idea, use your hat! Let me back away.” My husband said, “I’m going to sweep it off of you and throw it to the right, run to your left as soon as it’s off.” He scooped it right into the hat and threw the hat while we ran in the other direction. Everyone stood there until it flew out of the hat, at which point, they all ran away screaming. My husband said, “I can’t believe you didn’t move, I thought you were going to freak out and try to shoo it off you and get stung.” I said, “The way he said DON’T MOVE I thought there was a snake at my feet. Compared to a snake, that was nothing.” We never were able to identify what it was, so I’m not sure how close to death I was, my guess is not close at all.
Everyone was ready to leave Skull Rock because we were all a little nervous that it might come back. Unfortunately, none of us could figure out where the trail went from here. We all knew it was a loop, so no one had brought a map, but it looked like there were 10 possible paths to choose from. Since it was 103 degrees, we decided not to risk hiking the whole loop since we couldn’t be certain which path to follow. We hiked back out the way we came in along with everyone else.
There are bathrooms located at the campground, but no drinkable water. We decided to eat some snacks at the campground since there was also trash and recycling available before heading off for our next hike on Arch Rock Nature Trail. This was our fourth out of seven hikes for the day. If you’d like to check out some other hikes located in Joshua Tree National Park click on the links below. As always, wishing you happy travels and fantastic adventures in this thing called life.
Hidden Valley Picnic Area Trail
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Hiking Skull Rock Nature Trail
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