kc, John Michael and I experimented with a vacation during one of John Michael’s school holidays. We rented an RV from a local business and visited Death Valley for five days.

We found a good spot to park the RV in the Furnace Creek area of the park, which is centrally located and has some nearby amenities like a pool, fuel station and Timbisha Shoshone Indian Tacos and Shaved Ice(?).

In our second night at Furnace Creek, there was a large group of off-roaders who had gathered there. After exploring all day, they had a group dinner and bonfire. One of them invited John Michael over to help throw wood on the fire. As the night went on they all came to the bonfire and sat in a circle watching him tend the fire. When he needed to go sleep, he went around the circle and, shaking hands, thanking every one of them for letting him tend the fire. They were so tickled that one of them, Mel, invited John Michael for an off-road vehicle ride the next morning.

The Mesquite Sand Dunes are located in the northern part of the park. One of the great things that we saw was in the parking lot. A big tour bus parked nearby us and about 40 Eastern European adults got off. As the tour leader walked off towards the dunes, all the others took turns getting their photo taken next to a Dodge Ram 2500 Heavy Duty pickup truck parked next to us!

Nearby the dunes was Stovepipe Well. It was one of the few places to obtain water in the valley and, according to the information plaque, they would erect a tall stovepipe there for others to be able to find it.

We went to Zabriskie Point, just south of our campsite, to see the sunset and even though it was cloudy, we were not disappointed.

We took a ranger-led tour of Harmony Canyon, to the south. The ranger was quite well-informed as to the geology of the region and it was pleasant to have John Michael comfortably asking her questions. Badwater basin was nearby and we toured that ourselves. It is the lowest point in the park and in the Western Hemisphere. The salts are a mixture of NaCl, borates and others. Much of this area was covered in 4 inches of water just two days earlier.

None of us wanted our trip to end. We did a few more mountain biking rides for which I will create a new post.

One the way home, we stopped at the Calico Ghost Town near San Bernadino. It was a bit touristy, but also informative. They pulled a lot of silver out of this little area and it is nice that what little is left of the settlement has been preserved. There was a lot of craft stores, some of them pretty good. We came mid-week so it was nearly deserted. Some has been rebuilt, but done in a realistic manner. John Michael had fun there. He found the ultimate, for him, trip souvenir there!