*I will be writing about my experience in Yosemite tomorrow. But today, please enjoy this piece about another popular Labor Day destination: Palm Springs.
The following story was told to me one time by an Uber driver during Coachella. He also asserted that Marilyn Monroe was murdered in a mob hit by Frank Sinatra, so I completely trust him. I have not fact checked.
In the early days of Hollywood, actors were contracted to studios. An actor would receive a weekly salary and in return they would do whatever movies the studio decided to cast them in. There was a clause in the contract that you could never be more than 100 miles from LA because at any time they might need you to come act in something.
Palm Springs is 99 miles from Los Angeles.
Thus a playground was born for the rich and famous, a place where one could 'get away from it all.' A place where one could bang hookers, do drugs and carry on sordid extra-marital affairs with other men all seemingly far away from the bright lights of Hollywood.
I first went to Palm Springs three years ago on Labor Day weekend. I was with my roommate and his new girlfriend and all of her friends. I didn't know the group very well, but we decided to rent a giant house in the middle of the desert and see if we would get along. I spent that weekend blacked out on Fireball, openly insufflating Adderall XR and chain smoking at the Ace Hotel, all the while openly putting on a show of PDA with one of the girls.
Somehow three years later I am still tolerated by this group.
Trip two to Palm Springs was a Coachella trip that involved acid and an Easter Egg Hunt. Trip Three to Palm Springs involved 2 cases of Smirnoff Ice and a drone.
If the above sounds like fun to you than you might have already deduced that I fucking love Palm Springs.
But then again, I also don't mind sleeping on pool mats in the kitchen. I like trying to come up with the darkest possible timeline in a game of Cards Against Humanity. I have three aces in the hole for Never Have I Ever. (Never done Butt stuff, Never been to Asia, Never eaten a Kit Kat) I am the target market of 'Who wants to split a 7 bedroom house 2 hours outside of LA for $80 a person and buy a bunch of beer, liquor and hamburger meat?' Palm Springs is the easiest and cheapest vacation you will ever take. (Aside from camping)
Maybe that experience isn't for you. But the question is...is that Palm Springs stuff? I did similar things at Lake Houses in Indiana or cabins in Big Bear. One time I was staying at a La Quinta Inn and we threw a keg in the pool and had a grand old time.
What we will try to deduce today is if there is anything inherently special about Palm Springs. If it is a legit location for a quick weekend getaway or if it is like La Croix, completely overrated.
"Hot take, Palm Springs sucks. It's hot and there is nothing to do."
I am looking at one of my coworkers, he is married and went for a quick getaway with his wife this weekend. I had received a similarly unenthusiastic review from my roommate when I asked him how his weekend was. "It was good."
Palm Springs is objectively hot. There is a high of 100 degrees today.
My coworkers observation is accurate. I will not argue this point.
'There is nothing to do,' gets a little harrier. Is there really nothing to do in Palm Springs? I've been to Palm Springs and I did a lot. I played golf, I invented a game where you throw a beer into the pool and the first person to swim to it gets to chug it! I drunkenly decided to climb a mountain in our backyard. And of course we cooked, played games and played music unreasonably loud.
Which is to say...I partied.
And then of course there is the nightly debauchery of The Ace. If you aren't familiar with Palm Springs you may just think the Ace Hotel is a downtown date spot for guys that are trying too hard. It's actually a hotel chain and their most famous hotel is an old converted Howard Johnson and Denny's in Palm Springs.
It turns up.
And while most of the people there are gay dudes just getting lit, there is plenty of fun to be had there by the common cis hetero male. Namely shitty DJs and a ping pong table. It's like going to the shittiest possible version of a Vegas pool and I love it.
I digress. There are objectively things to do in Palm Springs.
There are possibly other things to do in Palm Springs. I think the girls went antiquing last time while the men played golf. We played beer a hole 2 man scramble, but I'm sure the girls had just as much fun looking at old lamps.
That brings us to a very fair question: Is there anything to do in Palm Springs if you don't like to party?
Well I suppose you could have sex all day. That's something couples do once in a while right? Get some wine and just have a fuckathon? Also, I'm told that some people enjoy laying in the heat. In fact the Yiddish term for this is having a 'shvitz.'
On the outskirts of Palm Springs there is gambling and I think even some real life hot springs.
But again, most of the people I know go to Palm Springs, rent a huge house and rage all weekend. They take lots of snap chats, back flips are typically involved.
So is there anything to do but party in Palm Springs? Kinda. But not really.
And while one could argue that there is gambling and fuckathons and 'laying by a pool and sweating' in LA, I would parry that they are forgetting 'The Vacation Principal.'
'The Vacation Principal is as follows: going on vacation is fucking dope. It's something to get excited about and it's something to talk about after.
When someone asks you 'what did you do this weekend?' it's much easier to respond, 'Went to Palm Springs' than 'Got a room at the W and had sex with my wife 20 times.'
The latter is weird, the former is cool, even if functionally they are the same.
I am now confident that I have enough information to make a ruling on this matter.
If you want a fairly inexpensive, easy vacation to get fucked up with your friends, Palm Springs is an excellent choice.
As a couple's trip it still has value, but might not be as fun as something like Ojai or even Tarranea.
Palm Springs is not overrated nor underrated. It is not shitty, it is not great. Palm Springs is fine. If you go to Palm Springs you will have a fine time.
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