- Everything you need to know
to visit Palm Springs in California.
I'm Chris, that's the Traveling Princess.
In this video, we're gonna tell you how to get in,
how to get around, what to see, what to eat,
and of course, what to do.
All right, you ready to go?
- Yeah!
- All right, let's go.
The first thing though is just a little bit of background
about Palm Springs.
Palm Springs really became famous
as a resort destination in the 1950s
when the Hollywood stars would clock here
particularly for relaxation by the swimming pool.
There are a little over 400,000 people
that call the Palm Springs area home,
but there are 10,000 palm springs
which gives Palm Springs its name.
Yes, there are hot springs.
They're not in the city of Palm Springs.
I'll tell you where they are in just a little bit.
Now, Palm Springs, in addition to being known for pools,
it is also well-known for hiking,
and Palm Springs is also a great destination
for architecture aficionados
because it has the most mid-century architecture buildings
of any city in the United States.
So when you come here, it does feel like a little bit
of a time warp back to the 1950s and 60s.
The second thing you need to know
is just a little bit to get you oriented to this region.
And when I say region, Palm Springs,
Greater Palm Springs is really composed of nine cities.
There's the city of Palm Springs.
This is probably what most people they put in Google Maps.
They go there, it's got a neat walkable downtown,
but there are eight other cities that you should check out
particularly if you actually wanna enjoy the hot springs.
Those are in the town of Desert Hot Springs
just to the north of Palm Springs.
Now over to the east, you'll find the country clubs
and upscale resorts and spas in Cathedral City,
Rancho Mirage, Palm Desert, Indian Wells, and La Quinta.
And now you might think the famous music festival,
Coachella, is actually held in the city of Coachella,
turns out it's not.
It's in the neighboring city of Indio.
That festival and the Stagecoach Festival
draw almost a million visitors each,
and you'll find those way out there to the east.
The last thing in the region
you'll be interested in checking out
is Joshua Tree National Park.
That's the 800,000-acre national park just to the northeast
that we'll talk about in things to do.
The third thing to know is about getting into Palm Springs,
and most people, they are gonna drive.
The drive from Los Angeles is about two hours,
also about two hours from San Diego.
If you're coming in from Phoenix or Las Vegas,
that's gonna take you four hours.
Now if you wanna get in here and you don't have a car,
you can take the FlixBus from Downtown Los Angeles.
About $20 is what they'll start at.
Pretty economical.
If you're wondering, "Chris, what about the train?"
Amtrak does run three services,
not daily, but weekly in the Palm Springs.
Not really a super great option,
but you could also fly.
Palm Springs has its own airport, PSP Airport,
that surprisingly serves a number of carriers
and a number of routes as far as the East Coast of the US.
If you're not flying into Palm Springs,
many people would consider LAX being the closest,
but let me tell you,
you should consider John Wayne, Orange County, SNA Airport.
A much better airport
and turns out it's actually a closer drive
than LAX coming into Palm Springs.
Now the fourth thing to know is about
getting around Palm Springs.
And there's a couple walkable course in Palm Springs,
one of them, El Paseo right here in Palm Desert,
also Downtown Palm Springs.
But if you want to shop at these places,
the stores here close really early.
Like El Paseo, we're walking around at 6:30 PM
and, like everything is close.
So do plan to do your shopping and strolling
probably in the daytime hours
when the stores are actually open.
Now when you're not walking, you're gonna be driving.
This is definitely a driving town to get around.
It's the desert, things are far apart.
The good news is that the speed limits are pretty high.
The roads are pretty wide.
If you don't have a car, you can also do Uber and Lyft.
'Cause there's a lot of tourists here,
you'll find ride share to be pretty plentiful.
And by the way, this gallery on El Paseo,
Elena Bulatova Fine Art,
this one is our Traveling Princess's favorite.
Look! It's a melting Rubik's cube.
Have you ever seen a melting Rubik's cube before?
- [Traveling Princess] Yeah!
- [Chris] Apparently, they've got just everything
melting in here.
This melted art, they've got melting ice cream,
they've got melting lollipops,
and they've also got melting paint?
- [Traveling Princess] Hey!
- You should know about when to go.
And with 300 days of sunshine,
you know almost every day is a perfect pool day
here in Palm Springs.
But in the summer, it can be really quite hot,
like highs in the hundreds, 110 Fahrenheit.
The high season here is January to May.
That's when everybody wants to come here.
That's when pool season is the best.
That's when it's not sweltering hot,
but that's when room rates are gonna be expensive.
If you wanna kinda come a little bit sleepy time,
come in December before Christmas.
Room rates are low.
And weather, you know, the high temperature
almost never drops below 70 degrees here
so you'll be able to enjoy the pool even in December.
You should know about food in Palm Springs.
And there are two foodie hubs,
one of them is here in Palm Desert on El Paseo.
This is where you'll find some of the upscale dining.
Think a high-end steakhouses, California cuisine.
We dine here at a really good Mexican place called Mole,
but it's not gonna be tacos and burritos.
It's gonna be some pretty high-end enchiladas,
particularly Mole ones.
If you're looking for outdoor dining,
Downtown Palm Springs is the place you wanna be.
With 300 days of sunshine a year,
outdoor dining is quite popular.
Every hour in Palm Springs is happy hour.
It seems like craft cocktails are alive and well.
Plenty of local breweries, distilleries, and wineries.
While we're making this video in Downtown Palm Springs
we ate at Ruben and Ozzy's Oyster Grill.
We had some pretty tasty oysters and pastas, too.
Traveling Princess, she really loved her pasta.
You should know about where to stay in Palm Springs,
and if you're looking for someplace central
that you can walk everywhere,
Downtown Palm Springs is a great place to do that.
But just know that none of the hotels there
are gonna be super fantastic or super amazing.
If you're looking for the big resorts,
you're gonna wanna go out East Palm Desert,
which is where we are right here
at the JW Marriott Desert Springs Resort.
But for some reason,
Palm Springs is like a really expensive hotel market.
And I honestly don't understand
why the hotels here are so expensive,
but be prepared to pay a little bit of coin
when you're staying here.
Many of the hotels have gigantic swimming pools.
If you've got a little one, they might enjoy it.
So take a look at all the amenities that you want,
whether you wanna be by a golf course.
And for the LGBTQ community,
there's a lot of hotels and resorts that cater
specifically to you here in Palm Springs.
And you should also be aware if you're traveling with kids,
there's a lot of hotels and resorts
that cater to adults only.
So if you've got kids, beware of those.
And if you don't want kids around you,
well then you might wanna look out for those.
The eight thing to know is about things to do
and the Traveling Princess is joining me
for this one along with Lucille right here.
Where are we right now?
- I don't know.
- Downtown's your line.
(birds chirping)
- Downtown. - Yeah, we're in
Downtown Palm Springs.
And in Downtown Palm Springs,
the reason why they've got these celebrities
is 'cause if we come over this way,
Traveling Princess, come with me,
you can see they've got their Walk of Fame here.
Except, come look at these stars,
they're the celebrities from Palm Springs
and they've got the golden palm in the stars.
So find your famous
Palm Springs celebrities - No!
- in those stars.
No?
What are we doing instead?
- [Traveling Princess] No.
- Checking out the rainbow bench.
- Welcome.
Tada!
- The really popular activity in Palm Springs is hiking,
and there are tons of hiking trails here.
But you should know that a lot of them charge admission,
particularly ones on Native American land
and they close early.
We went to hike the Tahquitz Canyon Trail,
they closed at four.
We went to then go to the Andreas Canyon Trail,
also closed.
So make sure you check the closing times
so you don't end up closed on a random trail.
But even this one looks pretty nice.
Now, one of our favorite places to go hiking
is up the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway.
It is this really neat rotating tram
that goes two and a half miles, 8,000 feet up
where in the snow time, in the wintertime,
there's snow up there.
One of the best ways to see snow
without doing any mountain driving.
But if you're gonna do that,
make sure you book a ticket online in advance
so you don't have to stand in a long line.
Now booking the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway.
To book those tickets, you need to book them
not just like a couple days ahead of time,
but weeks ahead of time 'cause it's really popular.
Oh, and by the way, the closing times for these trails,
when they say they close at four,
like they close way earlier than four.
We got there before four and the trails were closed,
so don't even stretch it towards near their closing time.
Now in California, with Native American land
also comes casinos and there's plenty of them here
to get your gaming fixed,
even within walking distance of Downtown Palm Springs
at Agua Caliente Casino.
If you're driving into Palm Springs from Los Angeles,
the first casino you're gonna see is actually
the Morongo Casino in Cabazon.
You'll see it right alongside the Interstate 10
as you drive in.
There's also really big outlet mall next door.
But if you've got kiddos,
they're definitely gonna love a stop
at the Cabazon Dinosaurs.
These are the world's largest dinosaurs.
They've been featured in many movies
including "Pee-wee Herman's Big Adventure".
The Brontosaurus is a gift shop that you can go in
entirely for free.
And if you wanna go inside T-Rex,
well then you're gonna have to pay
about 15 bucks for adults, $12 for kids
to go in the dinosaur adventure
where you can see a whole bunch of other dinosaur statues
and then finally climb inside the head, mouth of the T-Rex,
which is pretty fun.
Our Traveling Princess did enjoy the stop.
We spend about one hour here on our drive into Palm Springs.
And the other neat roadside attraction on your drive-in.
This one's not a stop,
it's just kind of a look out of the car window,
are the giant wind turbines that you see.
It gets so windy here, right kind of at the mouth
to the Palm Springs area,
that this is a great place to generate power.
And these things are, I mean, they're really big.
And then finally, one of our favorite national parks
in California is Joshua Tree National Park.
Over 3 million people visit this park annually.
It's home to the amazing Joshua Tree
that only grows around this region.
They're great for hiking, rock climbing,
night sky viewing, and camping.
I should point out that camping
is kind of privative camping.
There's no like running water or electricity.
And Palm Springs is a great place to use as a base
if you're going to visit Joshua Tree
and you're not looking to camp inside the park.
And while you're in Downtown Palm Springs,
make sure to get a selfie
with Ms. Marilyn Monroe right here.
This is the new Palm Springs selfie spot.
It's in front of the Palm Springs Art Museum.
Our Traveling Princess was trying to do
the Marilyn Monroe pose,
so she lost her shoe.
Anyway, there's tons of art you can see around here
that you don't have to pay admission to go in,
just outside around the museum.
And you might enjoy watching
some of our other videos from Palm Springs.
You'll find links on the screen
or in the description below.
As usual, we won't say goodbye
'cause we're gonna see you in the next video.