Death Valley Off-Road Adventures

Agreed, and the reason for my visit there. But I don't think there's a Farabees on the island? You'd have to find a route from Furnace Creek! Or at least that's the joke I was going for there.

 

One of my former colleagues has been going there for work from time to time. I would love to go there just to drool.

 

Drooling is about all you’re capable of after going straight from sea level to 14,000 ft. We stood in an elevator inside Keck for like three minutes with one of the techs before we finally realized it wasn’t moving because none of us had pressed a button…

Debating whether to take our daughter to the top when we are there in a few weeks. Altitude sickness is no fun for adults, much less kids!

 

Never went to the summit but the drive from Hilo at sea level, to the visitor center at over 9000’ is about 40 miles and a quicker road than going from Stovepipe to Mahogany Flats, which is less of an elevation change. If you go, beware of Mauna Kea’s equivalent of DV burro’s;

 

I think you're better going to altitude in one go for a short visit than driving up and stopping/staying along the way. No idea how the kids fair.

It would be even cooler to see ALMA. Imagine getting a gig driving a transporter to move the antennas around. How cool would that be?

Edit: Transporters

 

Agree. Up and back down fast with minimal exertion and lots of fluids seems best if you don’t need to be there longer than an hour or so.

Yeah that location is more my style than Hawaii. My wife has been down to Chile a few times now and one time we hoped to do an Atacama trip paired with her observing run but it didn’t pan out. So still on my to do list!

 

I took a class from Matt Dieterich. His day job is this:

https://youtu.be/wfBtk0DKxBY

That would be a great gig. If you're interested, he'll probably post a video of a 1M Planewave install soon--he's in Chile at Obtech installing it.

 

Yeah, that's a good way of putting it. I was up there at night and tried to do some long exposures on my cellphone, as Kīlauea was erupting at the time and the sky to the south was glowing quite spectacularly. I braced it on a post but wasn't able to hold it still enough, so I tried holding my breath for the next shot. A few seconds in, I damn near passed out, gasping for air as if I'd run a marathon! And sadly... no photo to show off here.


Anyway.... Here's another non-DV photo dump that I hope might still be of interest to the thread.

Sadly I had to scrub my holiday-weekend camping trip plans yesterday -- I'm swamped at work, and my truck is still taken apart But we still managed to day-trip out to the Mojave, where we had reservations for a tour. This is a state park within MNP.



Pictures don't really do it justice, I highly recommend the tour. Note that it must be booked in advance.



They claimed the age of various features had been determined by carbon dating, but I saw through their lie. Clearly they had just counted the rings.



No tripods allowed in there, but it's lit up well enough for handheld shots with a fast lens.



UV illumination was used to showcase that this place is every bit as disgusting as a cheap motel room.



Definitely another gem of the Mojave! While I was there I picked up another book:



Guess you can't see it though. This one is Digonnet's "Hiking the Mojave," and I'm pretty excited to spend weeks on end exploring these areas, just as soon as I win the lottery. For now I'm adding it to the bookshelf next to the 4-volume "Eastern Mojave Heritage Trail" guide by Casebier that I just bought myself for Christmas. That is actually what brought us to the caverns today... we were supposed to be doing the first of many segments of that adventure I've been trying to plan for the year. Hopefully we'll have time for a few of them. It was a beautiful day out there, wish I was at camp and not at a computer screen.

On the way home we stopped in Ludlow. I wasn't aware of this particular aspect of its history:



Here, let's make that easier to read:



I love old route 66 stuff, and this Cafe was no exception. Like an idiot, I hadn't brought a single scrap of food with us, so we hadn't eaten a thing all day. The dude there cooked me up a breakfast burger which at that point seemed even better than exploring the caverns!


Gotta love the architecture.

 

Gosh I didn't realize that they had reopened them. Shows how long it's been since I went through the MNP! Adding it to the list of spots to visit when my boys are a little older.

 

I'm happy to see the caverns are open again. I stumbled across those in my early trips off-roading and exploring. It was an amazing surprise.

 

If you've enjoyed these, then you must both go visit Carlsbad Caverns National Park in southern New Mexico. It's a bit of a drive, obviously, but the caves are amazing. Take the hike down into them, and the elevator out. Bring a tripod, b/c they are allowed, and make long exposures easy to do.

We visited as a "prelude" to running the New Mexico BDR, and it was one of the highlights of our trip. (Full report of the caverns here.)

Into the earth.


Stone Bacon?!


Reflection.


Hanging in there.​

 

Can't remember if this has been posted here before...
https://youtu.be/9gOqSQc6cQk

 

Wrapping up our trip in the Ibex area of the park, we really enjoyed hiking to and visiting several more talc mines in the region. It was very interesting to see how one had been reclaimed, one had been destroyed (presumably by arson), and one was still in fantastical condition. And of course, there were a few in between. If you're a fan of old mines and haven't visited this area of the park before, I can't recommend it enough. It takes some (sometimes strenuous hiking), but it's worth it. Hike the Ibex Dunes while you're there, as well.

Final installment: Mines, Mines, Mines, all Mines!

Gigantic. My hiking companion, but an ant in the upper right!


In the distance to the northwest, Telescope Peak, even the sunny side covered in snow.




An amazing structure.


The railway - some of it more than 30 feet in the air - hugged the shape of the hillside as it collected ore from the twin 120-foot long ore chutes.
​

Plus, one really big disappointment when I found out that this guy drives a Tacoma. I don't really have the heart to find out if he's on here.

Final installment: Mines, Mines, Mines, all Mines!​

 

Which do you guys think is a more "difficult" drive? I know neither is really technical, just a lot of washboard...

Eureka Dunes or Racetrack Playa (both coming from Mesquite Dunes)? I did the Racetrack drive once about 8-9 years ago and I remember about 25 miles of washboard. I have never done the Eureka Dunes drive but from what I understand there is about 40 miles of dirt with some washboard involved? I am trying to decide on which one to visit during the limited time I have on my upcoming trip. The drive itself isn't the only factor for me, but was just curious.

 

Really depends on the conditions of the roads, your tires and suspension. I believe Racetrack gets more traffic and tends to become more heavily washboarded. But if it’s been recently graded then of course no issue. Eureka is further of course but usually Death Valley Big Pine road is smoother. The road off of their to Eureka can sometimes washboard badly as well. Again, it just comes down to which roads or segments have been graded the most recently.

 

Thanks @DVexile. I am just running stock suspension and Cooper AT3's. I'll have an air compressor, patch kit and full size spare if needed.

Is there a way to tell which road has been graded more recently? Or is that just a guessing game?

 

Don’t know of anyway to look up when grading has happened. You might try calling the Visitor Center, but I suspect it’s not likely whomever is there when you call would know. Sometimes you can get lucky and find a trip or road condition report from someone who has gone recently. Especially for Racetrack Rd since it gets so much traffic.

Definitely air down the AT3’s whichever way you go, they should be fine on either route. Stock suspension the two risks are feeling you have to go too fast to smooth out the ride and also the suspension over heating. Airing down should help a lot with ride smoothness so hopefully you can find a comfortable speed that isn’t ridiculously fast. Over heating just means making sure you take a few breaks along to way for it to cool - especially if you’ve opted to drive fast. Overheating the stock suspension is not a common thing, but a few people manage to accomplish it from time to time

 

Good info, thank you!

 

A couple years ago we spent a week in DVNP with our stock 2010 V6 Rav4. I had my 2011 Tacoma then, but it wasn't ready to go because of a failing CV bearing/boot and other maintenance. I'd like to say that if the Rav4 can make it anything can, but Rav4s are actually quite capable off road (as long as there's clearance). We took 4 adults (including a friend over 250#s), a kid and a crap load of day trip stuff over Red Pass and through Titus Canyon with friends in their Xterra. Only had to get everyone out and stack rocks once in the canyon.

Can't wait to get back there with my new taco!



Red Pass



Red Pass road cut.


In Titus Canyon.

 

3 days in DV, that was beautiful.

Lots of people at panamint springs campground, I have never seen it full before.

Saturday we went to Defense mine and Lookout, with a few side trips.i would say Defense is harder than Lippincott.
https://youtu.be/XzoSDFVnsf0
Sunday was an easy day, a couple of tough spots in Cloride city but nothing, of note, then a quick trip to Titus and whoops, I tore a boot.

Today we went to jailhouse canyon. Crap, no road, so we made our own.

https://youtu.be/gcwMw_IR2W0


And as a bonus, we headed out towards Trona and got a flyby

FF to 10 53:40

https://youtu.be/li0uNKkC76Y