Freitag, 1. Januar 2016

Winter break in Death Valley 3

After a good nights sleep at Pahrump in Nevada, we decided to return to the Valley for another day of hiking.
Today we planned for a round trip hike starting at Zabriskie Point. Stopping here even if you do not do the hike is worth it, because you have a wonderful view onto the Badlands.
There we took off and started on the Badlands loop, which took us to the intersection with the Gower Gulch Trail and Golden Canyon Trail. We decided on following the Gower Gulch Trail down into the valley and hike the Golden Canyon trail back up. Along the Gower Gulch trail you can see some old mine entrances and luckily they were closed - other wise my gold rush boys would have vanished into the mountain. The hike took us 3h - it can be done in less than that, but we took our time exploring the mine entrances, collecting stones or just climb around and enjoy the view. After that we drove to the sand dunes again - a special request from P and K. They had so much fun yesterday that they wanted to hang out some more. So we went to the Sand dunes again and enjoyed watching the sun go down behind the mountains and drove back to Ridgecrest for the night.

View from Zabriskie Point.

View along the way 1.

Trail in dried up flash flood river bed.

The boys.

Mountains.

The boys on the trail 1.

Weathered waring sign.

Dried up.

Wait - what is there?

A mine entrance.

The entrance.

And yet another mine.


Water break 1.

Of the beaten path.

Water break 2.

The boys on the trail 2.

The boys on the trail 3.

More Rocks and mountains.

The boys on the trail 4.

K pointing to Zabriskie point - it's not far, is it?

View along the way 2.

View along the way 3.


Winter break in Death Valley 2

Next day we took off to Death Valley NP.

On the way 1.

On the way 2.

First of all, everything we thought to know about distances changed, even if you think you are close - you are not! Next trail head is just ahead, I can see it, 30 min later it is still just ahead, but we are not there. We had great weather for hiking, sunny and around 15C.
We did a couple of small hikes, which we want to share with you. First we stopped at the visitor center at Stovepipe Wells and got a hiking map and had a picknick on the camp ground. All set and stocked up on water we are ready to go. Unfortunately, it turned out that some trail heads were only reachable with high clearance cars - so that shorted the list of possibilities for us quite a bit. Anyhow, we started off with the Mosaik Canyon, close to Stovepipe Wells a short gravel road takes you up to the trail head. Usually we like to do round trips, but the Mosaik Canyon is an in and out hike, never the less the rock formations are stunning and were worth to have a look at. K and P collected an entire bag of rocks for later closer inspection.

Rock formation 1.
Rock formation 2.
The boys.
Along the way.

Along the canyon 1.
Rock formation 3.

Flora.
In the canyon 2.

Along the canyon 3.
We spent about 1.5 h in the canyon and it was beautiful. Next stop were the Sand dunes. By the way, it takes much longer to return to the car than to walk out, at least it feels that way.
P and K all excited.

More and more dunes.

Fun sand.

The dunes were very high.

Dunes 1.

Dunes 2.

More fun in the dunes.

Boys chilling in the dunes.
Last stop of the day was Badwater. The famous salt lake right in the middle of the valley. The lake is 85.5 m below sea level. Crazy feeling to walk on this stuff, and stunning views - surrounded by mountains walking on a flat huge salt crust- perfect ending of a perfect Death Valley day.

Walking on Salt.

The Salt crust from up close.

The sign on the mountain shows the sea level.

Winter break in Death Valley 1


Death Valley here we come! - We had some free time after Christmas and decided to visit a place we for sure would not want to visit in summer. Family went to Death Valley NP. First day we went from Bakersfield to Ridgecrest, this is not Death Valley NP just yet, but we took it easy and explored Lake Isabella and drove over the Walker Pass. This turned out very interesting, we visited a touristy place selling lots of trash, but on the other hand had some old buildings from the gold rush times on display. We drove through an area full of Joshua trees, and it was so cold that there was snow around.


Historic buildings at Silver City ghost town 1

Historic buildings at Silver City ghost town 2

Historic buildings at Silver City ghost town 3

Historic buildings at Silver City ghost town 4

Lake Isabella

Joshua Tree high desert

F at Joshua Tree high desert

And yes there is snow (at Walker Pass)

And it was chilly (at Walker Pass)

But sooooo beautiful (at Walker Pass)

Museum at Ridgecrest

Museum at Ridgecrest
We arrived early in Ridgecrest, because we wanted to watch the Star Wars - The force awakens - and it was good :)