Joshua Tree Food & Juice
Tiny Town, Healthy Food
The town is super small. But it does boast one vegetarian restaurant and a few others are vegetarian friendly. The high number of rock climbers who come to the region, combined with the influx of new age folks has increased demand. There are even a couple of juice bars and the local Stater Brothers grocery stores sell Suja and Naked pressed juices. While they may be going mainstream, we frequently have to stick to a health food store.
Farmers Market
Yes, there is one. On Saturdays. And it’s not big.
Crossroads Cafe – Joshua Tree, California
Natural Sisters
Restaurants
Crossroads Cafe [LINK] Near the center, it’s a cool place to hang out and very veg-friendly.
The Natural Sisters Cafe (A Healthy Foods Eatery) [LINK] A restaurant, mini-art gallery, and verified juice bar. We had a great black bean and avocado burger.
At either Crossroads or Natural Sisters, you get a good idea of the vibe — friendly, small and healthy without too much pretense.
Black Bean Burger – Natural Sisters Cafe, Joshua Tree
Health Food Stores
Joshua Tree Health Foods [LINK] Located right next to Natural Sisters. It’s small, but it’s got hard to find and locally grown foods.
Coffee
As we travel around, we’ve found that coffee has become important. Not just to have some place to work, but we haven’t quite gone caffeine-free yet. So on occasion, we’ll mention a cool coffee spot or two.
Joshua Tree Coffee Company [LINK]
Tucked in behind Pie for the People, Roasters is a good spot for a shot of on-site roasted Ethiopian.
Pappy & Harriets
The concert venue of the desert deserves a mention because it’s an unexpected hip spot for live music. Like siting outside a vegetarian restaurant downtown, you never know who will show up. For example, Paul McCartney headed up earlier in 2016 for a surprise gig following the Desert Trip festival. And, if you’re a planner, The Kills show in March, 2017 is already sold out. If you’re in town midweek, they’re open Thursday through Sunday, with live music each day.
How the accessibility,reliability, speed of network communications? Can one build an independent biosphere as if on another planet?
From our experience, there is plenty of accessible and reliable network communication in the area. The town’s proximity to the marine corps base helps, as does the recent spike in popularity of the park. However, it is sparsely populated, and we did lose signal while out on some dirt roads. I would check before you buy or rent. As for the biosphere question, we aren’t biosphere experts and we’d suggest you talk to one.