Borrego Art Institute
Borrego Springs Natural History Association
Borrego Springs
May 5, 2019
We took a Sunday trip out to Borrego Springs to meet up with some high school friends of Meredith‘s for a picnic lunch. Their school was in Palo Alto, and just one classmate lives out in the desert, but several others came from different parts of southern California and two friends from further away. It was a nice gathering.
We arrived in town early and puttered around for an hour before meeting up with the group. Our youngest daughter jokes that our super power is that we can find a museum anywhere, and sure enough we found two different educational offerings to while away the time.
We very much enjoyed the Borrego Art Institute gallery. The exhibition was summer themed and featured local artists’ paintings and photographs with mostly desert scenes. It is a gallery, not a museum strictly speaking. The art is offered for sale, but the Institute is a nonprofit organization and runs classes as well. There was no charge for admission. We put a donation in the box by the door. There is an excellent restaurant next to the gallery – Kesling’s Kitchen — which is owned by the Institute.
We had a little time left before the friends gathered so went across the street to the Borrego Springs Natural History Association. They operate a bookstore, and there is a garden behind that building with a variety of native plants. We enjoyed strolling around. They had a lovely stand of about eight or 10 native palm trees. There were several butterflies in the pollinator area, but we did not see any hummingbirds. Maybe next time?
We first visited Borrego Springs in 1986 when our oldest daughter was a baby. We went in the spring to see the desert flowers.
We have been back several times since. The desert landscape is stark, but beautiful. The most memorable trip was probably our worst experience – when the three girls were very little, we drove there and back (about 2 hours each way) with two small children and a baby in the back seat of Bob’s compact Toyota Tercel. Nonstop complaints of “she’s touching me” spurred us to trade the Tercel in for a minivan; spread the kids out so no one could touch anyone else!