Road Trip 2013: Day Five

Won't You Spare Me Over 'til Another Year?

September 19, 2013

Soundtrack:

• Cibo Matto -- Viva La Woman!
• American Music Club -- Mercury

Thursday I found myself back on the road heading to California.  It started with the biggest mistake of my trip, which was wasting the early morning hours at Bryce Canyon.

Bryce Canyon National Park, UT

I woke up before dawn again.  What I should have done was head directly to the Queen's Garden Trail.  I'd have been able to get down the trail and back and on the road by nine o'clock.  I'd still have been able to make a leisurely drive and made it to Panamint Springs before dark.  I wouldn't have been able to horse around in Death Valley much, that would have been the trade off.  I can do Death Valley in a weekend, though.  That's not the case with Bryce Canyon.  Well, hindsight is twenty-twenty, right?

Bryce Canyon National Park, UT

It wasn't a horrible mistake, mind you.  I got some great early morning shots from Inspiration Point.  I'd been there in the evening and knew the place would light up a lot better in the morning.  It certainly did.  It was freezing, though, so I didn't stick around to take a lot of pictures.  My plan was to take a leisurely drive through Zion National Park then on to Vegas and Death Valley.  I figured if I got tired of driving I'd just stop in Las Vegas for the night.

Zion National Park, UT

Zion is about a two hour drive from Bryce Canyon.  When you hit the red paved roads of the park, you know you've arrived at someplace special.

Zion National Park, UT

The highlight for me was seeing a small herd of bighorn sheep along the side of the road.  I've never seen bighorn sheep in the wild.  I've always heard they're a bit elusive.  These guys didn't seem to be too bothered by the cars and people stopping to take pictures.  They didn't even seem to mind the kid yelling "Fight!  Fight!" at them.  Such patience.

Desert Bighorn Sheep -- Zion National Park, UT

It looks like there's a lot to see and do in Zion.  I'm definitely going to have to take a few days to spend there next time.  There's even a ghost town nearby.  I've never been to a ghost town.  I hear there's one near Mono Lake.  I need to check that out, too.

Zion National Park, UT

After Zion I headed on to Las Vegas.  Well, I basically drove around the outskirts of Las Vegas.  That's an interesting town.  I stopped at a casino for lunch.  I ate at the buffet.  It wasn't bad.  I won sixty dollars playing roulette.  Yeah, I'm pretty much a high roller.

Virgin River, North Fork, UT

If you're heading to Death Valley from Las Vegas, it's pretty easy to get there.  You head up Interstate 95 until you get to Highway 373, where you turn left.  You'll know you're at the intersection of 95 and 373 because the Space Alien Brothel is right there at the intersection.  You can't miss it.  There's a big pink sign and space aliens.

Dante's View, Death Valley National Park, CA

The nice part about coming in off of 373 is that it sets up a trek out to Dante's View pretty well.  The fourteen mile road to the viewpoint is right on the way into the valley.  I didn't go to the viewpoint last time I was in Death Valley because it's so far out of the way.  It's well worth the drive, though.  If the view looks familiar to you but you can't place it, if you go back and watch Star Wars again you'll recognize it as Mos Eisley.

Death Valley National Park, UT

After taking in that amazing view, I headed down to Furnace Creek, where the temperature gauge outside the general store read 120 degrees.  I'm skeptical that it was that hot, but it was definitely hotter than the 34 degrees I'd woken up to that morning.  I was going to drive down to Badwater Basin where the road was recently washed out by a flash flood, but it was getting late and I wanted to walk the Mesquite Flat Dunes in my bare feet before it got dark, so I headed there instead.

Mesquite Flat Dunes, Death Valley National Park, CA

I'm fascinated by these dunes.  The sand is very different than what you'd find on a beach.  The winds forms almost a hard crust on the surface that is lined with little ridges.  The dunes drift, but they don't move.  There have been sand dunes on this same spot for a hundred and fifty years.  I'm sure they've actually been there a lot longer than that.  There will be dunes in this spot for years or even centuries to come.  This is the point where wind current collide in the valley, dropping the dust they are carrying in the process.  It's amazing to me that these massive dunes could be created simply by dust in the wind.  That's all they are, just dust in the wind.

Mesquite Flat Dunes, Death Valley National Park, CA

Yeah, I know.  Now that stupid song is stuck in your head.

Mesquite Flat Dunes, Death Valley National Park, CA

I made it to Panamint Springs after dark.  That place is awesome.  It has a restaurant and a bar and the entire campground has wifi access.  There's zero cell phone coverage, which I don't mind since I so rarely use the damned thing.  The night air was incredible.  It was warm, probably over seventy degrees, with a nice dry breeze blowing.  After shutting the bar down (it closes at 9:00, fwiw) I sat outside in the warm air with no shirt on, smoked a cigar and finished off the beer in my cooler.  What a great night, a fitting final evening to my road trip.