Day 88: Death Valley

Today our driving adventure would take us from Vegas to Death Valley, California. None of us have been here (or anywhere near here), so we really wanted to stop. The weather this time of year is perfect, too.

We saw the “sea level elevation” sign on our way to our stop at the Furnace Creek Campground. This was a no reservation campground, and we were lucky to get one of the last two sites.

Rob had to do work, but I took the boys out for a quick hike at Zabriskie Point before their end-of-day calls. I had no cell phone service and there was no WiFi here, so we resorted to using screenshots of the map that we took before leaving. With little battery power and no charger minimizing my phone use, we ended up winging it more on our adventure than we probably should have at a place called “Death Valley”. Oops. The scenery reminded us of the Badlands of South Dakota.

After Rob finished up work and the boys their final calls, we headed out for a family adventure to Badwater Basin. There were a few other notable stops along the way, such as Devil’s Golf Course, but we were running out of time before sunset.

The basin is a salt flat and got its name when an explorer said there must be bad water here when his donkey wouldn’t drink from the lake (due to the salinity).

Nicholas and I opted for bare feet and felt the cool ground and bumpy texture from where the salt is pushing through from underneath. It was really interesting to see how the texture changed the further we got from the parking lot.

It got chilly quickly after sunset, and we headed back in the darkness. Rob had really hoped to do some stargazing at one of these remote stops, but our timing today wasn’t good–it was a full moon.