01/31/02:
Froze my butt off last night at Mojave Desert National Preserve at 4000 feet. This is the high desert. Temps down in the low 20's. Water jugs frozen solid.
Went back to Baker and north on CA-127 90 miles to CA-190 and then on into Death Valley National Park. Stopped at Salt Creek oasis at mile 30 north of Baker on CA-127. Nice trail but I don't know how long it is. I think I'll be going back that way and will do it then.
The whole drive up CA-127 is through a desert valley floor with nothing much growing except mesquite and creosote. Too dry even for cactus. Multi-colored mountains in the background rising hundreds of feet from the desert floor.
Pretty much the same heading towards Death Valley on CA-190... and then the mountains get closer and right in your face. Road kept climbing and I thought, "oh no, elevation... another freezing night." Then the road headed down, below 3000 feet, below 2000 feet, below 1000 feet, below 0000 feet. Yup, right on down below sea level. First time for me that I know of. All the way down to -190 feet at Furnace Creek which is in the Funeral Mountains in Death Valley. Sounds like a really fun place.
You're allowed to camp 2 miles from a paved road... except for a whole big list of places they've named. I finally found one at Scottys Well off West Side Road after driving past salt flats a couple hundred feet deep. Got out to taste some and sure enough, it's salt.
02/01/02 Hiking Golden Canyon Trail (5 miles round trip):
20's last night but no frost from my breathing? Either I didn't breathe or maybe it has something to do with sea level? I dunno. Hanupah Canyon Road is directly across West Side Road from Scottys Well. I ran up it for 20 minutes but it kept getting steeper. I walked 10 more minutes uphill and another 5 minutes on the way back, then ran the rest of the way. Did pretty good, all thigh work and not much strain on the heart or lungs. Hardly breathed at all going downhill.
Decided to go back out of the park the way I came in. I think I'll be leaving the park from the west into Sequoia National Forest and don't want to miss anything on this end. Stopped at Zabriskie Point on the way out. Great view.
Found a trail thru Golden Canyon so followed it to the Golden Canyon Trailhead on the other side. Lots of ups and downs over the mud hills. This whole area seems to be made up of high, steep hills made of dried and loosely compressed mud. Very pretty with varying shades of brown and tan with lots of gold colors and some shades of purple. Legs were a little wobbly by the time I got back to Zabriskie Point. Passed 3 borax mine entrances, just holes in the wall. Signs warning of deadly gas, cave ins and unstable explosives kept me from venturing close to them.
Continued out of the park to Dantes View. This is the first view in the park and is down a 13 mile paved road. It they built a road that long just for a view it must be worth it so I went. It was. Climbing to 4000-5000 feet or so, it presented a wide panoramic view of Death Valley below. Lots of salt flats on the valley floor and mountain ranges on either side of the valley.
Checked out 20 Mule Team Canyon on the way back into the park. Was really looking for a camp site but got a nice drive instead. I had passed up Hole-in-the-Wall Road because of the jeep picture indicating a 4X4 road. When I got to Echo Canyon Road and saw the same picture I turned up it anyway. It wasn't bad, just somewhat rugged and you had to drive slow. I stopped at the first available spot after the 2 mile limit.
02/02/02 Hiking Echo Canyon:
Balmy 40's last night. December & January are the coldest months in Death Valley... average high 65F, low 39F. February and November are warmer. Rest of year too hot for me. Record high 136F.
Followed the Echo Canyon Road up another half mile before I came to rocks in the road I couldn't get over with my 2X2 truck. So I got out and walked. As I approached the canyon the wind picked up considerably, gusting up in the 30's.
The other side of those rocks the road smoothed out and remained fine the rest of the way. A slight incline the entire way gave the hamstrings a workout as I maintained a pretty fast pace. I suppose when you start out below sea level, everything's uphill from there.
Echo Canyon is pretty neat with walls several hundred feet high with different textures and colors throughout. Lots of clean level campsites. I suppose the canyon is jammed in the summertime with lots of 4X4s with all the shade provided by the tall walls. At 11am much of the canyon was still shaded. It was much prettier and interesting when the sun finally did start to take over.
An hour or so brought me out of the canyon into the sun and the rock walls gave way to steep mud hills. I went another mile or so and then turned back.
Driving Artists Palette:
6 miles or so down CA-178 from Furnace Creek is the 3-4 mile long Artists Drive. I took it and found lots of multi-colored mountains. Volcanic deposits had many colors including purple, brown, yellow, white and green created by various minerals deposited on top of the volcanic material. No wonder they call this section the Artists Palette.
I drove down CA-178 another 15-20 miles or so past Badwater, with and elevation of -282 feet, the lowest in the U.S., before returning. Either the sun now shining on them or because I was heading north, the colors seemed to be spread throughout these mountains on the east side of Death Valley.
02/05/02 Hiking Titus Canyon (13 miles round trip to petroglyphs):
Moved deeper into Death Valley yesterday. Found a camping spot at 3000 feet along a no name canyon road off the road to Beatty. 40's with some wind last night. Drove the 20 miles to Titus Canyon which is on CA-190 on the way to Scottys Castle. 50's with a 10-15mph wind coming out of the canyon at 8:30am when I started out.
A well graded road goes through Titus Canyon and continues for 20-30 miles. 7-8 cars came by while I was hiking. Petroglyphs can be found 6.5 miles up the road. As it turns out, the constant incline created a 2200 foot rise in elevation from 900 feet to better than 3100. That does something for the hamstring and butt muscles.
After a couple hours I was just starting to make excuses to myself for turning around. With my normal luck I figured I'd turn back just before reaching the petroglyphs. This time my timing was off because I got to them just before turning back. Not much to brag about. A big horn ram, a sun and a bunch of squiggles on a hard, black, volcanic rock.
I never really did get out of the canyon even after 6.5 miles. Since the road goes on another 20 miles and 8-9 cars passed me on this Tuesday, I'd guess this is a pretty popular road with more canyons beyond. The first 6 miles were through a deep, narrow canyon with walls reaching skyward for 300-500 feet or so.
I'm on the lookout for big horn sheep and golden eagles. They are known to inhabit the region. I would suspect California Condors might be around somewhere too but there has been no mention of them.
02/06/01 Hiking The Sand Dunes:
This morning seemed bitter cold. No stream from my breath, no frost on the windows, no frozen water... just cold. Ran uphill for 10 minutes and then just didn't want to go any farther uphill. Rather than continue walking, I turned around and ran back. My feet were still cold when I got back to the truck. Soon as the sun came up over the hills, everything warmed up quickly.
This is an off day from hiking. Nothing long, just a couple of the shorter, scenic trails. Went to the sand dunes off CA-190 past Stovepipe Wells. Saw a flat road in front of me and started running... but 10 minutes later I just stopped running and started walking. I dunno why, I just did. My body and my mind don't always communicate properly.
Walking the sand dunes in Death Valley is like walking the sand dunes of a costal beach... just no ocean, no bikinis, etc. Of course if there was any water the salt flats would ensure it was plenty salty. Lots of critter tracks on the dunes though.
Left the dunes for Mosaic Canyon on the other side of Stovepipe Wells. Drove 2.4 miles up the typical washer board road although it did seem rougher than most even going 15mph. I got out at the parking lot and smelled rubber burning. I asked a guy if he smelled it and he said it wasn't him. A woman then asked if I had a spare. Looking around I found the right rear tire punctured. Before I knew it the guy and another who was passing had the tire changed for me while the woman supervised. I must have really looked feeble and unable to do anything for myself.
After thanking them I decided to go get a replacement tire right away. I was supposed to be heading for Ridgecrest, a decent sized town to the west of Death Valley. Instead I ended up in Baker, a much smaller town to the east. So I decided to keep going and go back to Bullhead City in Arizona to stock up on food, get an oil and lube as well as the tire.