S: Windy again. We'd had some vague plan of visiting the other desert parks on this trip, including the Mojave preserve, Joshua Tree, and maybe even Anza-Borrego down by the Mexican border. Though they're all pretty close - maybe a day's drive to the farthest -- our ambition has dropped away in the always-unreckoned vastness of Death Valley. But since it's so windy in DV today, we'll try and get a look at Mojave, the nearest, in hopes of somewhat calmer weather.
Past Badwater to Baker, the sand and dust blow across the road. Jubilee Pass, Ibex Mountain, etc., provide interesting names and weird rocks, but nothing to slow the Evelyn Wood Speed Tour.
On 127 southbound past Shoshone, the sand blows like snow in snakelets on the road, in places lowering the visibility to a matter of a few yards.
Baker has the world's tallest thermometer. Unfortunately, the world's biggest ass is currently in Washington DC. The Mojave visitor center is under that thermometer, and is closed until noon.
So, we decide to drive a small loop through part of the Mojave preserve to get a feel for it. It's a big place, maybe a third the size of Death Valley. Some volcanic stuff, big sand dunes at Kelso, odd rocks at Hole-in-the-Wall. It's not a good day trip from DV, because that entails more than four hours of driving, round-trip. I think maybe it's worth a separate visit -- BEFORE going to Death Valley. We stop by the railroad tracks where a low tunnel provides an avenue for flashfloods, looking in earnest for snakes, but no sign of them, just a lizard here and there.
We're not planning to pick up and play with rattlesnakes if we find them a la Croc Hunter et al. Just want to see one from a near-but-safe distance.
T: Mojave is quite beautiful -- but it's a different desert than Death Valley, and on this windy day with much driving, seems more difficult to appreciate. The Joshua trees, abundant blooming cactus and shrubs, make it a very different experience than DV's open miles-wide vistas. And, too, we don't find exceptionally good stopping points for a walk or a view.
I make a lot of noise about wanting to see snakes, but I don't ever really expect to do so. It's better for the snakes, in general, to stay hidden, and they are masters at it. Still, I smile to think of Steve and Terri Irwin, out there in the outback just turning over the rocks and finding all sorts of things immediately on-camera. Steve and Terrie Miller's experience is quite different. "If there were in fact a sidewinder here, he'd be glorious! He might be a bit grumpy, but we'd just leave him alone to do his very important job in this ecosystem."
I do try to curb my tendencies to take pretty rocks home as much as I can. However, we do have a couple of captive-bred Mojave species of King Snakes at home. So I did take two rocks, one each for Ringo and Dash, as a gift to them from their ancestral home.
We take advantage of cheaper gas on the return loop thru Baker -- only $2.03, compared to $2.59 (?) at Furnace Creek, before we return via 190 and more blowing sand.
S: On the way back, the Amargosa Opera house has an interesting story, and a somewhat interesting exterior, but it's closed.
After the siesta, we have a few beers and visit the campground at night. The wind that has stirred the dust is what obscures the stars - mind you, "obscured stars" in DV means more stars than you'd see from most suburban backyards. But when it's clear out here, the number of stars you see at night is truly mind-boggling. We miss that on this trip, but the flowers make up for it some. A ghostly coyote makes an appearance.
T: These coyotes! We've not seen them in Death Valley before. Ghost coyote seems to be evaluating us for the possibility of a hand-out, and for a while I strongly want to encourage him to come closer. But after getting a good look, and realizing that his survival may depend on his fear of humans, we scare him away intentionally.
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