Death Valley Off-Road Adventures

Flew into Phoenix last week and drove the in-laws to the Bay Area. I couldn't convince them to skip the tourist BS in LA* and let me take them through Death Valley, but at least I was able to talk them into letting me stop at Red Rock Canyon, so that I could take the scenic route back to I-15 and catch a very distant view of Telescope Peak**, slurp on a date shake, and go to the place that made me love gyros so many years ago. Imagine their surprise when they woke up in the backseat of the van at China Ranch, thinking that I was driving them straight to the hotel in Long Beach.







* I was wholly unsurprised when they were pickpocketed at the Chinese theater.

** I think. I'm 95% sure that's Telescope in the background on that photo. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong.

 

DTLA? Yuck.

 

I don't do rain dances but the past couple trips have included lots of rain.

 

One of those date shakes should have convinced them you did the right thing.

 

My favorite is their coffee date shake.

 

Also sometimes called...nah. I better not.

 

i'd set camp last month at eureka dune. actually stayed two nights in one spot. unusual, normally gotta go by 10am after breakfast, drive that is. weather reasonable just prior to ramping up to unreasonable the following week. got several full military-power flyby's.
some of these pilots are routine. some put on a good show. one pilot came around the north end of the dune with wings vertical then rolled 180 degree on approach to dedecker canyon..i could see the top of the dunes above the wingtips. another pilot came wide around the north end right over my truck and continued to loop around the south end, the west side and back around the north end for a lower louder second pass and completely obliterated my position. next day while standing next to front fender to piss, without the distant sound warning a black object showed directly in my sight, the perspective i'm looking at the sharp point seeing the hard edge of cockpit glass, unusual fuselage planar, two of them tailgating, noise level banging my ears to shit. i'd pissed on my wheel trying to watch the full overflight.

 

This video describes a problem which has been discussed here many times. Sparing you, I just deleted a paragraph-long rant about trendy overlanders and social media.

A good watch:

 

Keep it secret, keep it safe.

 

Hopefully, the current social media "Look at me" craze we are living in will become passe, and the rest of us can go back to normal life....

 

No point in keeping secrets. Things like quotations, pictures, etc. All give it away. The Internet makes it easier to find.

idk. Until people stop paying for content, probably won't change much.

 

I picked up a copy of Michel Digonnet's 2nd edition. I was curious what the differences were and thought I'd find them in the book or maybe in a review. Aside from the new forward, not many hints as to the differences. Not many reviews either, well, that were more or less "wonderful, buy this book" The Forward is signed in Paris, France. I'm sure he's retired by now.

I will say that for a dude from France, he sure does love Death Valley--he came first in the late 70's/early 80's when he was working on his PhD at Stanford. Just really blows me away how complete his works are--maybe it shouldn't. He is the inventor of the Fiber Optic Gyroscope.

 

Funny. I've been saying that since 2005. This shit is here to stay. Best any of us can do is not post about places that aren't totally fucked and let the "influencers" keep going to the same crowded spots.

 

I don't agree. If you know a place that doesn't get much traffic or visitation the best way to keep it that way is to not to post photos (especially geotagging) and/or locations.

 

100%

 

If you say nothing, don't post images, no one will know so you're right. But what I'm suggesting is if you post pictures, quotes from historical figures, etc. then finding a place isn't that hard.

 

He has done work on FOGs but their invention pre-dates him by a fair bit. First demonstrated in 1976. Digonnet’s first FOG related publication in early 1990s. Operational FOGs had been flying for a good while before that.

Anyway, he’s a super talented engineer besides being an amazing DV explorer and author.

 

I looked at the number of patents the dude holds--looked at a couple. I think his last was granted a week or two ago

Personally, I'm looking to him for the tabletop particle accelerator.

btw, he was a grad student at Stanford in the late ‘70’s and I think I read somewhere that his thesis had something to do with FOG which is why I thought he was one of the inventors.

 

odd


think about food



too much junk



food in death valley



think about food again with view in death valley



lunch stop on location with good view of death valley



bloom