Anybody remember a desert museum near San Diego?

Since folks have been writing here about Route 66 / Amboy and since there's been a related question nagging at me for the last few years, I'll post my question.

I remember an old desert museum that my family used to always stop at, spanning at least 1960-1973, probably even into the 1950s. When heading inland from San Diego towards Desert View Tower / Jacumba / Salton Sea / Indio / Palm Springs, via I-8 and smaller offshoot highways, it was on the left side of the road. It was a single story, single room museum that was a popular tourist stop. The windows were made of bottles pointing inwards, and on the inside were flat display tables covered with chicken wire to prevent theft, and the displays were unorganized and unlabeled desert things like purple sunbleached bottles, rocks, sand concretions, bullets, arrow heads, ocotillo stems, fossils, skulls, even pieces of coral and shells. There must have been a gift shop and refreshments and bathrooms, and I think there were interesting things outside, too, maybe wagonwheels or sand concretions or something along those lines.

I e-mailed a guy who had an extensive website about that old desert route and its attractions, but he never wrote back. I'm unable to find any reference to such a museum online. It's not the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, I don't think, because that's in Arizona, and it's not the Palm Springs Desert Museum, either, since it was closer to San Diego / Salton Sea. It would take somebody who actually remembers the museum, I think, to know which place I'm talking about. I also remember a refreshment stand in that desert area from the late '50s & early '60s that probably served ice cream, and had outside shaded tables near the window, and the exterior wall of the stand made of rose quartz. If either of these places rings a bell and if someone can narrow these places down in location or names, I'd appreciate it.

[ Edited by: mbonga 2006-03-06 18:07 ]

That sounds really familiar but I'm probably thinking of a similar place in Scottsdale, AZ. The only other place that springs to mind is the museum inside the big dinosaur on the way to Palm Springs just this side of the windmill farms (where Pee Wee spilled his heart to the kindly waitress in "Pee Wee's Big Adventure").

mbonga,

I travel quite often from San Diego to my favorite camping spot in the Anza-Borrego State Park via I-8. I am not only quite familiar with Desert View Tower but most everything else along that stretch of road, and no, sorry to say, whatever one-story museum used to be there is long gone. And believe me, I keep my eye out for kitsch.

If one is heading east, when one comes upon Desert View Tower then it's time for fast downhill ride as the road drops from a roughly 4,000 ft. elevation into the sea-level flatness and wide expanse of the beautiful desert. As one continues along the 8, there are abandoned homes and gas stations and businesses to the right and left, sitting there like derelict vessels at sea, and perhaps one of these was the ice-cream stop you mentioned.

Take the Ocotillo exit and there you will find the brand-new Imperial Valley College Desert Museum. Here's their website:

http://www.imperial.cc.ca.us/ivc-dm/

On 2006-03-05 11:31, Shipwreckjoey wrote:
The only other place that springs to mind is the museum inside the big dinosaur on the way to Palm Springs just this side of the windmill farms (where Pee Wee spilled his heart to the kindly waitress in "Pee Wee's Big Adventure").

No, that's Cabazon off the I-10 that has the dinosaur, and that's a very different route and place. I'm quite familiar with that area. By online maps it looks like the route I'm referring to would be I-8 from San Diego to Highway 86 alongside Salton Sea up to Indio. My guess is it was along that highway 86, or possibly somewhere in the Anza-Borrego desert area. Good try, though, thanks.

http://home.znet.com/kat/directionstoborrego.htm

[ Edited by: mbonga 2006-03-06 18:10 ]

Some of what you are describing sounds like it might be from Calico, back when the
Knott family ran it.(I think it now is under the County of Riverside, or the State) It is sort of in that neighborhood.

I know that's not the road you mentiond, but the whole Bottle house thing sounds just like there.

There is also a similar type of thing in to that in Desert Hot Springs called Cabot Xerxes Indian Pueblo, where some old nut built a house in the desert, built UFO landing areas, and lived at peace among his friends the flora and fauna of the desert.

On 2006-03-05 16:33, Gigantalope wrote:
Some of what you are describing sounds like it might be from Calico, back when the
Knott family ran it.

I see by the following site that there is such a bottle house in Calico...
http://totalescape.com/destin/all_towns/calico.html
...but that's not the building I'm thinking of.

Also, Calico is on a special looped side road off of Highway 15, north of the I-10, if I interpret online maps correctly, and the I-10 itself is too far north of the area I remember. The place I remember is one that we passed all the time on the main road, so it had to be nearer to the San Diego - Indio route, which would end at the I-10. I visited Calico in the '80s and that definitely is not the correct area. The last year I saw that museum was in 1973, on a family trip to Arizona, which makes me think it might have been on I-8 itself.

I believe the place I remember had only a few bottle windows, not the entire wall. It was also in an isolated spot with no other buildings/competition around it, which strategically made it a prime location for tourists to stop at. Like Desert View Tower, it had been around literally as far back as I could remember, and it must have been in business for at least 15 years. It's hard for me to believe a place that had been around that long and was so unique and attracted so many tourists could so completely disappear from memory and records by now. If I could only find out the name, looking up info about it would be relatively simple. The name was probably something along the lines of "Jake's Desert Museum."

I'll look into that pueblo thing you mentioned. Thanks for your suggestions. Of course if I ever do learn the name of that mystery museum, I'll let everybody know.

P.S.--If you've ever seen the made-for-TV movie "Gargoyles" (1972), it was very much like that old guy's desert museum in that film. I thought that might even be the same place, at first, but it's not. Also, I'm starting to remember a lot of purple sun-stained glass bottles at that museum, I believe outside of it on the sand, maybe with a cactus garden out in front.

[ Edited by: mbonga 2006-03-05 17:22 ]

[ Edited by: mbonga 2006-03-06 18:13 ]

There is a place called the living desert in the Palm Springs area, and they once may have had the srot of stuff you are mentioning.

http://www.livingdesert.org/

Also the Palace (Pappy and Harriet's Palace) may have once had such a display in it's past but I can't imagine that being the place you mean.

Good luck, and I'll keep thinking. ZebraTiki and Dawntiki would be good to enlist in your search. Those two are sharp and remember details no mortals could compete with.

My best guess is that Jacumba used to have a museum. It used to be quite a tourist stop when the Jacumba Hot Springs was in operation.