Like millions of hikers before her, Kiwi Claire Nelson is drawn by the Joshua Tree National Park's unusual scenery, but she almost didn't survive her last visit.
Claire Nelson says she’s "still amazed that I’m here, to be honest."
"There were points at the end of the week where I thought, 'This is it – no one's gonna come and find me,'" Ms Nelson said.
Speaking from her hospital bed in California, the 36-year-old writer explained how, on Tuesday, she accidentally strayed off the trail, fell and smashed her pelvis.
"I was trying to get some footing over one big rock and immediately just started to slide. I heard this crack and just doubled over in pain and I was screaming."
Unable to move and with no cellphone signal, Ms Nelson knew she was "in massive trouble".
All she could do was wait for three long nights and four days.
"I was really paranoid about rattlesnakes, coyotes, scorpions."
Despite rationing her water supply, by Wednesday, she was forced to drink her own urine to survive.
"I had no choice. I had to bottle my own urine and drink it, and it happened that at the time, it actually wasn't a hard decision. It's just like, I just need to make sure that I'm hydrated.
"I'm not gonna say that, 'Oh, you know, it's not too bad'. I mean, it's amazing what you get used to when it's a life-or-death situation."
The toughest part was surviving the pain of her injuries and keeping up her spirits.
"Part of me was just adamant that this was not the way this was going to end for me. I've made a big mistake, but it just didn't feel like this was the end.
"There's too much I wanna do, too much I wanna achieve and too many people I wanna see again."
Concerned friends reported her missing and by Friday, Ms Nelson heard a helicopter overhead and attracted its attention by waving a t-shirt on her walking stick.
"[There was] this huge sense of relief. You know, I was too dehydrated to cry, but that's pretty much what I was doing."
Now that she's recovering in hospital, Ms Nelson say there's something she'd much rather drink.
"By the third day, I was getting really sick of it. All I really wanted was a beer!"
Doctors will be operating on her pelvis on Monday.
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