Valley of Fire, Nevada

I am on a walk with my four year old boy in Springs Preserve, a 180-acre cultural center in Las Vegas.  We are walking on a hard, sandy soil when suddenly my boy shrieks in the most horrible terror I have ever heard.

I turn to him and drop to his level.  What’s wrong?  I ask.  But I can already see that he has stepped on a dried branch with one-inch thorns.  All six have penetrated cleanly through his thick-soled hiking shoes.  He is crying so hard that his tears are like projectiles out of his eyes.  I tell him that I have to take off his shoe very carefully, and please stay very still. 

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