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Entering the Desert


Saturday was Valentine’s Day. Somehow, driving around with another guy in the middle of the desert didn’t feel very Valentinely to me. So, we sort of forgot about the occasion. It dawned on me that a plausible explanation to why our negotiations broke down with the other potential participants of the trip was because Valentine’s Day was not the type of quality time you want to spend with two other guys, no matter what your situation was.

Coming back to driving through the desert, we did that for a few hours before we finally came to the entrance of the park. There really wasn’t anything that marked it as an entrance, just a looming mountain range, and a line on the map in my hand. We had less than half a tank of gas left, and we fretted a little about running out before the next gas station.

At first glance, the valley does not seem to be any more impressive than much of the scenery along the arduous roads that lead to it from Los Angeles, Bakersfield, or Las Vegas. The land was dry and covered with coarse pebbles. All the smaller components such as soil and dirt had been blown away by the wind due to the minimal vegetation cover. Occasionally, a drunken tumbleweed would decide to cross the road without a thought of its own safety. Every direction we look, the brown mountains were always in the background, barren and imposing. As we stopped at Stonewell Pipes to fill up on gas, we were somewhat relieved see that there were many other visitors to the park – bikers in leather, retirees in RVs, and even that one couple that decided that it would be a good idea to park their brand new Honda Civic at the gas pump.

Of course, the first stop on our itinerary was the Furnace Creek Visitor Center smack in the middle of the park. Always visit the Visitor Center in the National Parks. They give out really cool glossy high-quality maps, and the rangers, as always, were extremely helpful in telling us where to visit and how to get there.


This post first appeared on Travel Memories, please read the originial post: here

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Entering the Desert

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