Palm Springs in three modes

Wed, 02 Oct 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Palm Springs has three audiences and pretends not to notice. There is the weekend crowd that arrives Friday night with reservations at a steakhouse and leaves Sunday afternoon with a sunburn. There is the longer-stay visitor who rents a house with a pool and never really leaves it. And there is the small population of people who actually live here, who you mostly do not see, because they are smart enough to be inside between June and September.

A good first trip means picking which one of those three you want to be and planning accordingly.

When to go

This matters more in Palm Springs than almost anywhere else.

November through March. The high season. Hotels are full, restaurants take reservations weeks out, and the weather is genuinely perfect — 70s during the day, cool at night, almost no chance of rain. Expect to pay for it.
April through May. Warmer, less crowded, still pleasant. Probably the best value-for-experience window. Bring shade.
June through September. It is too hot. Locals will tell you 110°F “isn’t that bad because it’s dry,” which is true at 7 a.m. and a lie by noon. Hotel rates collapse, which is the only reason to consider it. If you do come in summer, plan around the pool: out by 9, back by 4, never in between.
October. Transitional. Some weeks are October; some weeks are still summer. Watch the forecast.

Where to stay

The split is roughly:

Mid-century resort hotel. The Parker, the Saguaro, the Ace, and fifteen others in their orbit. You’re paying for the pool deck and the aesthetic, both of which are real but neither of which will surprise you.
House rental with a private pool. Best for groups of four or more, and for anyone who’d rather cook than make reservations. The pool will be smaller than the photos suggest. Most are inland from downtown by a few minutes; the views from the pool deck are usually the mountains, not the city.
The cheaper motels along Palm Canyon. Honest, fine, and a useful fallback during high season when nothing else is available. You will hear the highway.

Skip anything in Cathedral City unless you specifically want it; it’s not within walking distance of anything pleasant.

What to actually do

The honest answer is “nothing, on purpose.” The pleasures of Palm Springs are non-events: a long breakfast, a longer swim, a drive into the mountains for dinner, an early bed. A few specifics that justify a trip:

The aerial tramway up to Mount San Jacinto. A genuinely good idea on a hot day — 30°F cooler at the top, a few hours of pine-forest hiking, and you are back in the desert by sunset. Buy tickets online; the line in person is often longer than the ride.
Joshua Tree National Park. An hour northeast. Best at sunrise or sunset; punishing in the middle of the day. Bring more water than you think you need, and gas up before you go in — there are no services inside the park.
The Living Desert (technically in Palm Desert). A small zoo and botanical garden focused on desert ecology. Better than it sounds, good for a slow morning.
VillageFest on Thursday evenings on Palm Canyon. A street market. Mostly tourist-grade, but pleasant in November.
Date shakes at one of the date farms in Indio. A specific, regional thing worth doing once.

Skip the celebrity home tours.

Eating

Restaurants in Palm Springs cluster into three tiers and there is not much in between:

The hotel restaurants. Fine, expensive, atmospherically excellent at sunset.
The midcentury-themed restaurants downtown. Fine, less expensive, atmospherically a little tired by the third night.
The strip-mall restaurants in Cathedral City and Palm Desert. Where the locals eat. Mexican, Thai, sushi. Better than tier 2 and a quarter of the price.

A reasonable strategy: tier 1 for one nice dinner, tier 3 for the others, breakfast at whichever bakery is closest.

Practical notes

The wind. Palm Springs sits at the mouth of a wind tunnel. Late afternoons and evenings can be genuinely strong — strong enough to make outdoor dining unpleasant. The wind almost always dies overnight.
The coyotes. Real and not shy. Don’t leave small dogs unattended in yard or pool area at dusk.
The drive in. Coming from LA, leave before 3 p.m. on a Friday or after 7 p.m., and never on a holiday weekend. The 10 freeway through Banning becomes a two-hour parking lot.