Guest post by Mona Weir Daly,  2008

Palm Springs was a relaxing and warm getaway for our family of four. We were tired of the cold in Central Oregon and wanted to warm up somewhere exotic. After looking into Hawaii, Mexico and the Caribbean, we decided that we needed somewhere closer home to fit into our budget. So we decided on Palm Springs for 5 days.

It was an excellent choice, warm and relaxing and not too expensive! We flew into LAX and rented a car through Budget.

Our hotel was the Wyndham Hotel Palm Springs, which boasts the largest swimming pool in Palm Springs. While it didn’t have the fancy slides, it did have a nice, large pool lounge area, plenty of hot tubs around the round pool and a restaurant and bar to order food. My husband and I relaxed and read while the kids swam all day.

We would order lunch at the pool from the restaurant. The weather was nice — in the 80′s to 90′s. While the hotel lobby was elegant and had a great, albeit, expensive morning buffet breakfast, our room was so-so. It did need some remodeling, but we weren’t in there much to really mind. We did love the proximity to downtown.

We ended up walking to all the restaurants to eat breakfast and dinner. (After an expensive first morning breakfast at the hotel.) Sherman’s Deli, only two blocks from our hotel, became our breakfast stop. It is an old local restaurant that gave the kids coloring and activity books to do while we waited for our breakfast. You have the option of indoor or outdoor seating. Basic food, nothing fancy, but not expensive either.

Our favorite place to eat dinner was Dale’s Lost Highway on E. Tahquitz Canyon Way. The menu had a large selection and we sat outside while watching old Superman cartoons they projected up on the building wall next to the restaurant. Fun and different! Another nice place we found for dinner was Las Casuela, just around the corner from Dale’s and on the main strip.

One day we took a tour of the Living Desert Museum. A great place to spend the day checking out Rocky Mountain sheep up on the hills behind the museum and all the other exotic desert animals.

And one other day was spent touring the Indian Canyons park. It was the perfect time of year to see the springs flowing through the canyons and the rare blooming flowers of the desert. We took a picnic lunch, hiked up one of the canyons and laid out on the rocks while the kids splashed in the cool water.

After five days we felt rested, warmed up, and ready for the rest of the cold spring back in Oregon.