Death Valley National Park, August 16, 2005

On Tuesday, we got up and drove to Death Valley National Park.  We decided to drive to the north, then back down through the valley, so we drove up US 95 150 miles to NV 267, north of Beatty, NV.

This route takes you down a canyon to Scotty's Castle.  We stopped and had lunch on some nice picnic tables in a park there.  We decide to not take the tour.  We would have liked to take the underground mysteries tour, but you need to arrange that in advance.

After lunch, we drove to the Ubehehe Crater, an old volcanic crater.  The road to the Racetrack was along the way, but it was 25 miles on a 4wd road and I was at about 1/2 tank, so I didn't want to have to make a trip back to Beatty or Furnace Creek for gas, so we didn't go.  20/20 hindsight, I wish I had filled in Beatty and made this trip.

We then drove down to Stovepipe Wells, where there are some Sand Dunes and the Devil's Cornfield.  From there, you head down (literally) to Furnace Creek, elevation -190 ft.  The road goes below -200 feet at the Salt Flats, but I neglected to get a picture of the -200 feet sign, expecting to get one at Badwater.  We stopped at the Visitor's Center at Furnace Creek and then had some ice cream at the Furnace Creek Golf Course.  The road to Badwater was closed due to flooding from the rains earlier in the week, so we didn't get to visit the lowest point in the US.  We drove out past the Furnace Creek Inn, to Death Valley Junction, where the Amargosa Opera House stands.  We then took State Line Road to the Ash Meadows National Wildlife Reserve in Nevada to see the Devil's Hole.  The world's entire population of a certain species of pupfish live in the water in the cavern.

We then drove back to Las Vegas via Pahrump (about 60 miles).  That night we had dinner at Benihana's in the Las Vegas Hilton (travel to and from courtesy the Monorail, see previous posting).