Joshua Trees

Against a stark setting in Joshua Tree, artists and musicians make their homes near high-desert loners. Mainstream buyers may find it all too hip. But where else in Southern California can you pick up a home on 2 acres for $250,000? Beginnings Named after its plethora of Joshua trees, the unincorporated community in San Bernardino County has grown gradually in the last century.

A cold, insistent wind twirls about the high desert sands of Joshua Tree, pushing through doorways, penetrating layers of wool and leather and whipping errant strands of hair across the face. Up a remote twist of uneven, cleft-ridden dirt roads made more precarious by recent rains, vehicles bump and wobble as if they're mule-drawn wagons. Here and there, cottontails and kangaroo rats scuttle through the scrub brush of the uncompromising terrain.

The city of Lancaster, departing from common government practice, did not appraise 22.5 acres of land it purchased recently from an investor and ended up paying 45% more than he had paid three years ago. Lancaster officials contend they were not required to get an appraisal and even say the city got a good deal. But city critics have questioned the price, and officials at other government agencies said they believe state law almost always requires appraisals, in part to safeguard public funds.

It's a dry heat - a boulder-studded, wind-raked Mojave heat, in which rock stars lie low, artists think big, marines train, weird plants jut toward the sun like beseeching biblical figures, and climbers cling to granite walls like insects stuck to flypaper, except the climbers are way happier. That's a notable thing about Joshua Tree National Park and the towns around it. While legions of Californians keep their faces to the beach, no matter the season, a certain stripe of traveler is powerless to resist the desert, especially in cooler months.

Morning light revealed pitched tents and scattered sleeping bags in front of the sales offices of luxury builder Woodbridge Pacific Group. Attracted by a dozen new Huntington Beach homes touted as "starting in the low 1,200,000s," about 15 hopefuls had camped out for days. They were waiting for a chance to get their names on a list to buy into the first phase of a new subdivision. One would-be buyer had flown in a friend from Las Vegas to hold his place in line. Another shopper had hired a pair of men to wait in 12-hour shifts.

MUSIC Dance your heart out in the desert at the 10th Annual Joshua Tree Music Festival. This fantastic roster of bands including Fork Knox Five, Gaudi, Breakestra and MC Rai is guaranteed to satisfy all your world-music and open-space cravings. The Joshua Tree Lake Campground, 2601 Sunfair Road, Joshua Tree. Various times, Fri. to Sun. $120. http://www.joshuatreemusicfestival.com.

I thoroughly enjoyed the article "Camera Ready Inside Joshua Tree" (Weekend Escape, Jan. 13). As a graduate student at UC Irvine in the late '70s and early in 1998, I spent winter vacations in Joshua Tree. All my photos remind me of a totally alien landscape, almost prehistoric. The isolation of the campsites was something right out of Stephen King: the cold morning silence with not a breath of wind; weird rock formations; twisted and aged metal and wood in the most ungodly places; palm and Joshua trees; cactus; the occasional beer bash.

Having read the Grimms' article on Joshua Tree, the following week my wife and I traveled to view the wonders of this national monument. The article expertly described the beauty of the region, orientation guidelines, national park regulations and the many, fascinating nature experiences. As the article suggested, I phoned the 29 Palms Inn543256164accommodations at $42 per night; the clerk laughed and said, "You must have read The Times article. We have no deluxe rooms--they are all bungalows."

Joshua Tree National Park has become a destination of taggers , and the graffiti has visitors and park officials outraged. "We come to this place because it's not as touristy as surrounding national parks, and you don't run into as many people. You kind of feel like you're alone. In ancient times. There's nothing like this place," said Butch Wood, 51, a guitar builder visiting from North Aurora, Ill. "You don't like to see the modern world intruding on history. It's a shame. " The graffiti in Rattlesnake Canyon, which meanders for a mile through the northern edge of Joshua Tree's Wonderland of Rocks, started with just a few markings but quickly became rampant.