Death Valley | RV There Yet?

Yesterday when I was searching for a header photo for the Sabbath Rest post, I came across this photo (above) from our visit to Death Valley National Park in late March of 2010. Seemed like a good chance to take a stroll down memory lane!

Revisiting the Bucket List – 3/31/2010

Death Valley National Park
It wasn’t even on my “bucket list” of things I needed to do while on the West Coast. So when Gary said we were going there before we headed to Arizona, I wondered what there was to do there. I mean, with a name like Death Valley – sure didn’t seem like a very interesting place to me. Well, four jam packed days (and 700+ pictures) later, let me tell you, there is LOTS to see and do in Death Valley.
Did you know

The highest temperature recorded in the USA was in Death Valley (134 degrees)
The same year the highest temperature was recorded (1913), the lowest temperature (for Death Valley) was also recorded – 15 degrees above zero.
Death Valley National Park is the largest National Park in the lower 48 – 3 million acres of wilderness.
The lowest elevation in the Western Hemisphere (282 ft. below sea level) is found at Badwater in Death Valley.
The highest point in the lower 48 (Mt. Whitney at 14,491 ft) is just 100 miles from that lowest point.

Enough of statistics! I was expecting to see desert and desert-y things. What I wasn’t expecting were mountains of unbelievable colors, volcanic craters, a castle, moving rocks, and lakes of salt. I’ve pared down my pictures and tried to be at least a little organized, so here we go – the highlights of Death Valley National Park, Conrad-style!

Titus Canyon
Now there are two ways to see Titus Canyon. One is to drive to the canyon head (about 1/2 mile) and then hike up the extraordinary canyon. OR, you can drive all the way out of the park and approach it from the other side, driving along a “high clearance, 4×4 vehicle recommended” road for about 25 miles. Can you guess which one we chose?

The road was one way (which I LOVED) and never really got too “technical”, but we did encounter something that we had rarely come across before –

TRAFFIC!
And while we tried to stay back (mostly so we wouldn’t be choking on their dust),

We did finally end up in a traffic JAM!

Looking back while we waited for folks to start moving again….

We eventually got around the crowd (they all stopped at various POI’s along the way), and made our way into the canyon –

and after an amazing drive through the canyon,

we made it out the other side! It was a great drive – and if you’d like to see a couple more pictures of the drive and canyon, Here you go! –
Since the drive took a little longer than we expected (you know, the traffic!), we decided to take in some of the areas that were close to our campsite.
Like the Harmony Borax Works –

And the Salt Creek Interpretive Trail –

The Salt Creek is home to the Devil’s Hole pupfish – an endangered species found only (so I’m told) here in the Death Valley region.

Our final stop for the day was Mosaic Canyon – Amazing!

A couple more Mosaic Canyon pictures are HERE

And that was Day One. I think I’ll split this up into a couple of posts, so you don’t get into picture overload (like that would ever happen on one of MY posts!) 🙂
Take a break – I’m going to make us some dinner!

I hope you enjoyed this little walk down memory lane – I know I did!

We’ve been to a lot of National Parks in our travels. And I can’t think of one that I wouldn’t go back to again. But I’ll confess that when Gary suggested we go (for several days, even!) to Death Valley National Park I wasn’t that excited. Death Valley? Didn’t sound like a place I needed to go and see. Well, I was wrong – big time wrong! Here’s a memory from our visit there 10 years ago!

3/31/2010 – Death Valley – Second Day
OK, dinner’s over – back to the memories.
I forgot to mention one other stop that we made on our first day –
The Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes

We didn’t actually get out and climb those big ol’ dunes, but there were others who did –

They were pretty amazing!
But, back to Day Two –
Remember how this is the largest park in the lower 48? Well, we were camped close to the middle of the park, and we still had a forty mile drive to our first stop –
Scotty’s Castle

We splurged and did a “combo tour”, so we got to enjoy both an Inside Tour (along with lots of stories about the castle and its builders), and the Underground Tour, which included details on the mechanics of the castle, which was quite an engineering feat.

As you can see, it is pretty remote and in the desert after all, but it did have access to an underground spring that produced 300 gallons of water per minute, so they had that going for them. Can you see the big hole in the ground in the front of castle?
Here are some close-ups –

That was going to be the swimming pool!!!! Check out the viewing windows in the deep end – how crazy was that?

I was standing on that center bridge when I took the pictures of the deep and shallow ends. I can’t imagine how over-the-top this pool would have been (not to mention how quickly the water would have been evaporating there in the desert) had not the owner run out of money. It was a fascinating tour – and I took lots of pictures. Here are just a couple –

and plenty more HERE!
Next Stop -(down a 20 mile dirt road) – The Racetrack, home of the mysterious moving rocks.

The Racetrack is a large dry lake bed called a playa. It was pretty fascinating just to look at-
from a distance

and close up –

and very close up –

But what really draws people to this remote spot are these rocks

that move across the lake bed

leaving trails behind them.

I haven’t a clue how this actually happens, but I’m glad we got to see them. Quite an interesting phenomenon, don’t you think?
After the Racetrack (and back that 20 miles of dirt road), we took a quick stop at the Ubehebe Crater –

and then we were on our way back to Lizzie,

and a beautiful sunset.

Another good day in the valley!