If you own a home here, you already know the old rhythm. The snowbirds fly out in May, First Weekend goes dark until November, El Paseo ArtWalk pauses, and a good chunk of the restaurants you cycle through October to April lock the doors and put the patio furniture away. Summer 2026 is the first year that shape has genuinely broken, and it broke in two very specific places.
The two facts that reset the season
A 5.5-acre surf lagoon is opening between the fairways at Desert Willow
DSRT Surf, a premier surf resort, is set to launch Phase 1 in summer 2026 with the opening of its Wavegarden surf lagoon and leisure pool, on a 17-acre site tucked between the Firecliff and Mountain View courses at Desert Willow. The scale is the part worth sitting with: the 5.5-acre surf lagoon will deliver consistent, high-performance, ocean-like waves, with the Wavegarden Cove system capable of producing up to 1,000 waves per hour in a variety of styles, allowing beginners and advanced surfers to ride simultaneously across multiple sections of the lagoon. The pool has capacity for 70 surfers at a time and up to 1,200 individual surf sessions per day.
Phase 2 is the resort layer on top. The property will ultimately deliver a 139-key barefoot luxury hotel, 57 private luxury villas, yoga, restaurants, and pickleball courts, planned as Phase 2 following the 2026 debut of the surf lagoon and leisure pool. Operations are being run by Michael Gerano as vice president and general manager, who brings more than 20 years of hospitality and operational leadership experience and has been a Palm Desert resident for the past decade.
The Fix on El Paseo broke its own tradition
On June 18, NBC Palm Springs reported something that would have been unthinkable five years ago on El Paseo. One beloved Palm Desert staple is doing the exact opposite of the seasonal scale-back: for the first time in its nearly decade-long history, The Fix on El Paseo has announced it will remain open throughout the entire summer season, expanding its menu options to entice local diners and support the community. The reasoning is not tourist-facing. The move is born out of a deep commitment to the restaurant's workforce; owner James stated that his primary goal is to provide steady income and job security for his core employees during the year's slowest months.
Read those two announcements together and you have a thesis, not a coincidence. A 17-acre year-round attraction is opening on the north edge of the city while an El Paseo anchor decides the summer is worth staffing. The direction of travel is the same.
What "closed for summer" used to mean on the mile
The convention on El Paseo has always been that the season runs on a Nov–May calendar. The Tripadvisor summary of the district still reflects that convention plainly: the free Courtesy Cart operates Oct–May, and the marquee anchors — El Paseo ArtWalk on the first Fridays of the month Nov to April, The Gardens Concert Series Jan–Apr, Fashion Week El Paseo mid-March, and Palm Desert Food & Wine mid-March — all sit inside that window. First Weekend, the umbrella program the city has leaned on for years, is explicitly a shoulder-season instrument. First Weekend Palm Desert, held monthly the first weekend from November through May every year, is a monthly three-day signature celebration featuring world-class art and cultural activities, dining and shopping specials.
None of that runs in July. What has been missing every summer is a reason to leave the house between the pool and the grocery store. The Fix opening its patio through August is small on its own. Sitting next to a lagoon opening a mile north at Desert Willow, it reads as the first move in a new pattern.
The water math is the part that unlocks the story
The obvious objection to a surf park in the desert is water. The developer's answer is specific enough to check.
The surf lagoon will be a net-zero water user through DSRT Surf's "Turf for Surf" program, which converted 30 acres of adjacent golf course turf into drought-tolerant and native landscaping. This landscape conversion is expected to save 34.8 million gallons of water annually, more than the surf lagoon's projected annual use of 23.8 million gallons, resulting in a net savings of 11 million gallons of water each year.
That is why the city was willing to plant a wave pool between two municipal golf courses. It is also why Desert Willow itself is changing shape this year. If you golf Firecliff or Mountain View regularly, the sightlines off the back nine are different than they were in 2024. Thirty acres of turf are gone, and a lagoon has taken their place. That is a landscape change residents will notice long before Phase 2 finishes.
City leadership is on the record about the strategic bet:
"We're proud to welcome DSRT Surf to Palm Desert," said Palm Desert Mayor Evan Trubee. "It's the kind of project that reflects who we are as a city, open to new ideas and always looking for ways to create unique experiences for the people who live here and the folks who come to visit."
The phrase to catch is "the people who live here." Palm Springs Surf Club, up the valley, has treated summer as its high season for a while now, with Saturday after-hours pool parties from 6 PM–10 PM featuring live DJs, cocktails at the Island Bar, and access to the Island Pool and Lazy River under the lights, and a Bar League every Wednesday at 7:00 PM inspired by America's Favorite Quiz Show. Palm Desert has been the quieter city in that comparison. DSRT Surf is the first project that closes the summer-programming gap on the Palm Desert side.
A resident's July week, restructured
If you're building your July around what actually operates now, the shape is different from last summer. Pulling only from what's currently open or confirmed:
- Morning, most weekdays. Desert Willow tee times are still the coolest, quietest hours you get. The new landscape between the courses is the interesting scenery change.
- Wednesday or Thursday afternoon. The Palm Desert Visitor Services desk is still the useful anchor for what's actually on this week, and it's open inside Palm Desert Public Library where you can browse brochures, guides and maps. This is more useful in summer than in season because the event calendar thins and you want to know what's real.
- Dinner, mid-week. The Fix on El Paseo is the new option. Larkspur Grill at Hotel Paseo has been the reliable summer-open kitchen for a while — an elevated but casual dining experience where California Cuisine gets an All-American twist. Two anchors on the same mile is a different equation than one.
- Late June to early June carry-over. Restaurant Week ran from May 29 - June 7 across the valley, and the prix-fixe habit tends to leave lingering summer specials on menus into July. Worth asking.
- When DSRT Surf opens. The company confirmed the opening date will fit as part of the project's first development phase, with public opening in early summer 2026. No firm public date at the time of writing, so the practical move is to watch for it week by week rather than plan around a fixed date.
What still runs on the old calendar
Not everything has moved. It's worth keeping the old anchors straight so you don't overpromise a summer visitor.
Fashion Week El Paseo stays a March event at The Gardens. Palm Desert Food & Wine ran March 19-22, 2026, presented by Agua Caliente Casinos and taking place at The Gardens on El Paseo, and the participating chef roster included Curtis Stone, Alex Guarnaschelli, Nancy Silverton, Jet Tila, Zac Young, and Afrim Pristine — a mid-March lineup, not a summer one. First Weekend and ArtWalk both come back in November. What has changed is that summer no longer feels like the space in between; it now has its own headline events instead of just the wait for them.
The through-line
The story residents will be telling their houseguests by August is not "there's a new restaurant" or "there's a wave pool." It's that the shape of a Palm Desert summer stopped mirroring the shape of a Palm Desert winter. Business owners are staffing through August. The city has planted a year-round anchor on the north side that pulls a completely different demographic than the golf season does. The mile of El Paseo has more of its lights on than it did last July.
For anyone who owns here, that has small, practical implications. Reservation friction on El Paseo in July is real for the first time in years. Guest-room math changes when there's a legitimate day plan for August visitors. And if you have been thinking about the resale story of your home, the honest read is that Palm Desert now has a 12-month narrative for the first time, not an eight-month one. That's the kind of shift that shows up in listing copy for the next several years, whether or not anyone puts it in those words.
If you're weighing what any of this means for your own place — whether it's timing a sale, evaluating a second home in the Coachella Valley now that summer isn't a dead zone, or just deciding whether to hold and enjoy the season you didn't used to have — reach out to Sherri Lopez. Let's connect — get your free home valuation or neighborhood guide, and we'll talk through what summer 2026 actually means for your address, not the average one.
