Death Valley National Park: A Colorful Surprise
Nov. 2021
View from Zabriskie Point: We could see people on the trail below, so far away that they looked like tiny dots.
Death Valley surprised us: we had expected a flat, dull desert and instead got great scenic drives and trails full of color. By going at the beginning of November, we avoided the unbearable heat, and enjoyed pleasantly warm days, instead. Death Valley is huge! We saw only a small portion of it. We drove down into it from the west side, off US 395. It took a couple hours to get to the east side, not including stops. We stopped first at Father Crowley Vista Point. We parked the RV and then walked down a dirt trail to an overlook above a canyon nicknamed Star Wars Canyon, because the colors look like the fictional planet Tatooine. Fighter jets from nearby airbases sometimes fly low through there, but we didn’t see any that day.
We drove down that windy road after leaving this vista point.
We drove past the Mesquite Sand Dunes, but decided not to stop there, as we would be seeing more dunes at White Sands N.P. in a few weeks. Also, we couldn’t go to Scotty’s Castle, as it has been closed for several years due to flood damage. After driving quite a ways, we arrived at the park visitor center, where, as we do at every national park, we bought a souvenir magnet and a sticker for the side of our RV. By this time, we headed to our campground, as we still had at least another hour to drive. We haven’t actually camped in any of the national parks for several reasons: we like having electric hookups, and most campgrounds within the national parks don’t have any hookups. If any sites do have hookups, they are snapped up fast and are unavailable. Some campgrounds don’t take reservations and are first-come, first-served. We don’t like not knowing whether or not (most likely, not) we will have a place to stay. Also, usually the sites are small and not long enough for our 32-footer plus toad. So that all means we have to drive farther away from the parks to find a place to camp.
We drove the car back to the park on another day to have a full day to explore. Our first stop was Zabriskie Point. This was one of our favorite places in the park. So many gorgeous colors!
The next place we wanted to go was the one-way Artist’s Drive, which included a stop at colorful Artist’s Palette.
Artist’s Palette
From there, we drove to Badwater Basin, the lowest point in North America. We walked on the salt flats. Even though it was early November, the sun was intense and it was warmer there, so we didn’t stay too long. It was cool to see how the salt crystals formed polygon outlines on top of the crust.
It was not the best time of day to try to get a good photo of the salt crystals, as the bright sun was right overhead.
Then we wanted to hike a trail, and had heard that the Golden Canyon trail was a good one. Was it ever! We were so glad we hiked this trail. The rock formations and colors were so cool. We could have gone farther to the red rocks in the background, but we were getting tired after a busy day.
There was a lot we didn’t get to see, such as the borax works, twenty mule team canyon, and the racetrack (we would have needed a high-clearance vehicle with heavy-duty tires for that last one). Maybe we can come back someday.
