We Escaped Death Valley - Alive!

We saw Death Valley National Park last week, luckily, while temperatures were below the normal highs for this time - day time temps reached only 96 degrees. It had been almost eleven years since we last were here, and I had forgotten how absolutely stunning this park is. The one unique feature everyone comes to experience, of course, is Badwater, the lowest spot in North America at 282 feet below sea level.

Badwater

Badwater - A six inch deep hole reveals very salty water below is close to the surface.

Believe it or not, there's an 18 hole golf course at this elevation.

Or you can play here- on The Devil's Golf Course

Artist Drive, Death Valley National Park

Unique colorful mountains surround the valley. This is along Artist's Drive.

So many people had recommended that we should not miss a tour of Scotty's Castle. The combined guided tours (we did both the house tour and the underground tour) were $20.00 per person. It required driving out of our way by two hours which we figured was about $25.00 in fuel so it wasn't a cheap outing. I'm happy to report we both felt it was definitely worth it. It's a most unique story and the park does a great job of telliing it.

Scotty's Castle

It has been a few weeks since I wrote. Where else have we been in that time?

We spent several days in Mojave Desert National Preserve. Having never been in this park before, we were very impressed and we had several great hikes here.

We visited three main areas in the park. Hole-In-The-Wall was my favorite.

I'm using rings embedded in the rocks to climb along the Ring Loop Trail.

Kelso Visitor Center at Mojave Desert National Preserve

From Mojave, we moved on to Tecopa where we checked out and compared every hot spring resort in the town.

We even found a quiet (free) hot spring in the nearby desert with plenty of boondocking spots around it.

We had yummy date shakes and toured China Date Ranch.

The Amargosa River Valley - an easy hike that included a waterfalls and a slot canyon. How could we resist?

We loved Red Rock Canyon State Park.

A walking tour of Randsburg, a "living" ghost town.

Do Trona Pinnacles look familiar? They've been featured in movies like Planet of the Apes and many others.

Near Ridgecrest, we visited the Wild Horse and Burro Adoption Center. There are more wild horses and burros in the the west than there is food and water to sustain them. This BLM agency rounds up animals in endangered areas (mostly in Nevada), feeds them, gives them medical attention, and then offers them for adoption. These are young, healthy horses and anyone can apply to adopt one for just $125.00. We decided we don't have room for a horse but gave up our carrot supply while walking around the various paddocks.