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Thank you for your support Photo: Kit Fox taken by Sicco Rood Update from Bri Fordem, Executive Director There’s something extra special about this time of year in the desert. The days begin to cool,
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Thank you for your support
Photo: Kit Fox taken by Sicco Rood
Update from Bri Fordem,
Executive Director
There’s something extra special about this time of year in the desert. The days begin to cool, familiar trails start calling, and people who love Anza-Borrego begin making their way back to the Park.
We all come back for different reasons. Maybe it’s a trail you’ve walked for decades. A night beneath the stars. The first glimpse of a bighorn sheep. A family tradition. The geology, wildlife, and history. Or simply the feeling of returning to a place that has become part of your life.
What does Anza-Borrego mean to you?
It’s a question I’ve been thinking about lately, and one we’ll be asking our community more often in the months ahead. Because behind everything we do at Anza-Borrego Foundation are people with their own stories about why this extraordinary place matters.
You’ll find some of those stories in this month’s eConnection. David Van Cleve takes us into the Park’s past with the remarkable story of its patrol airplane. Naturalist Lizbeth Bárcena brings us along on a campout in Grapevine Canyon, documenting the landscapes and life along the proposed Golden Pacific Powerlink route. And we explore what it actually means when a place within Anza-Borrego is designated as wilderness.
There are also plenty of opportunities to make new Anza-Borrego memories this season—from Archaeology Day and Pints 4 the Park to another year of programs and experiences throughout the Park.
As you return to the desert, I hope you’ll think about your own answer to that question: What does Anza-Borrego mean to you?
We’ll be sharing more stories soon. And we’d love to hear yours.
Bri Fordem
Executive Director, Anza-Borrego Foundation
Welcome Back to
Anza-Borrego!
We are so excited to welcome you back for another season in the Park. The temperatures begin to drop. Favorite trails start seeing hiking boots again. Campgrounds fill with familiar faces. And people who love Anza-Borrego begin finding their way back to the place that has given us so many reasons to return.
If Anza-Borrego is one of your places, welcome back.
It doesn't matter if you’ve been coming here for decades or are about to experience your first-ever desert season; there are countless ways to find your place here.
Explore Expert-Led Programs and Events
This season, more than 120 events and experiences are planned throughout Anza-Borrego—from guided hikes and naturalist talks to stargazing, family programs, and opportunities to discover more about the remarkable landscape around you.
Come learn something you never knew. Explore somewhere you’ve never been. Meet people who love this place for some of the same reasons you do. EXPLORE THE EVENT CALENDAR
Bring the Park Home with You
Maps for your next adventure. Field guides for the curious. Books, hats, gifts and reminders of a place you love.
SHOP ONLINE for desert-inspired gear, books, and gifts, or VISIT OUR TWO STATE PARK STORE LOCATIONS, including our expanded State Park Store.
And every purchase does something more: it gives back to Anza-Borrego Desert State Park.
Seasonal Park Information
Maybe your first stop will be a trail you walk every year. Maybe you’ll finally explore that canyon you’ve been wondering about. Maybe you’ll come for the stars, the wildlife, the geology, the solitude, the people, or something else about Anza-Borrego that's difficult to put into words.
However you experience it, you belong to a community of people who understand just how special this place is.
Welcome back to the desert.
Moments in Time with Dave Van Cleve: The Saga of 70 Delta
How do you patrol more than 1,000 square miles of desert? Sometimes, from the air.
In this month’s Moments in Time, former Park Superintendent David Van Cleve shares the unlikely story of 70 Delta, Anza-Borrego’s patrol airplane—from the determined people who fought to bring it to the Park to the pilots who used it to protect resources and save lives.
It’s a story filled with ingenuity, adventure, and some unforgettable moments in Park history.
Get Your Tickets Soon- We Will Sell Out!
Join us on Saturday, October 24, from 5:30 p.m. – 8:30 p.m. at Anza-Borrego Desert State Park Visitor Center for an evening of craft beer & wine, local food, live music by Glenn Smith Music, and community beneath the desert sky.
Your ticket includes admission, food catered by a local restaurant, a reusable ABF logo stainless steel pint glass, free parking, and two craft beers or wine for non-members or three for ABF members, ages 21 and older.
Field Notes from the Proposed Golden Pacific Powerlink Route
What does the landscape along the proposed Golden Pacific Powerlink route look like up close?
Naturalist Lizbeth Bárcena is finding out—one campout at a time. Her first stop was Stuart Spring in Grapevine Canyon, where she documented a thriving desert chaparral ecosystem, dramatic skies, summer rain, dark nights and an extraordinary diversity of desert life.
Lizbeth will continue camping at locations along the proposed route each month through March—and you’re invited to join her.
Read her September field notes, see what she discovered, and find the dates and locations for upcoming campouts.
So much life. So much at stake.
Anza-Borrego Desert State Park Upcoming Events:
Check out the Park's upcoming events: Park Interpretive Calendar
Register for Archaeology Day Field Trips here!
“Wilderness” in Anza-Borrego has a specific legal meaning. California's State Wilderness system was created to preserve places where natural forces remain dominant, the imprint of human activity is substantially unnoticeable, and people have opportunities for solitude and primitive, unconfined recreation. These lands are to be protected and managed, so their wilderness character remains unimpaired for future generations.
Grapevine Canyon lies among this protected landscape, including the Grapevine Mountain Wilderness, in an area that has figured in past transmission-route planning and is relevant to today's conversation about the proposed Golden Pacific Powerlink.
Protected landscapes reflect a commitment to what we intend to preserve.
That designation is a major part of what makes Anza-Borrego extraordinary. The Park contains 12 wilderness areas, and its General Plan identifies roughly 400,000 acres as State Wilderness.
Shop Local This Desert Season!
As you return to Anza-Borrego this season, make the local community part of your visit. Shop, dine and stay with our Borrego Partners and support the businesses that make Borrego Springs such a special part of the desert experience.
Desert Lovers & Co
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