National Parks: Death Valley, Zabriskie Point

Harmony Borax Works

It’s odd how traveling to a foreign land inspires you to see something you’ve missed closer to home.  But sometimes that is the way it works.  At least that is the way it works for us.

We started thinking about a trip to see Death Valley while visiting Chile’s Atacama Desert. The Atacama’s parched landscapes intrigued us.  It inspired us to look closer at the desert lands nearer to our home in California.

The view from Zabriskie Point

If you are looking to see deserts in the United States, Death Valley is a good place to start.  With an average of about 1.6 inches of rain a year, Death Valley gets about 40 times more rain in a typical year than does the Chilean Atacama.  But, at low altitude, Death Valley is much warmer than the Atacama.  In both places, California’s Death Valley and Chile’s Atacama, the environment is severe.  And in both places the extreme conditions inform the landscapes.

In Death Valley we based in Stovepipe Wells.  After our impromptu night at Panamint Springs on the western edge of the park, it took only a short trip to relocate the Airstream to Stovepipe Wells’ small RV Park.

With a base camp established it was time to explore Death Valley.  Unhitched our first destination was Zabriskie Point.  Zabriskie’s overlook provides a view from the top into a patch of barren, intensely yellow-colored badlands.  The badlands extend down into the valley.  The view is dramatic.  Still it’s a surprise that an obscure movie was, for some reason, named after this spot.

A bench with a view of Zabriskie Point

With the warm light of the setting sun bringing out intense colors in the hillsides, we sped back to Stovepipe Wells.  On the way a stop just off the road took us to Harmony Borax Works and its interpretive trail.  Continuing from the Borax Works a short unpaved road winds through Mustard Canyon.  Mustard Canyon is not so much a canyon as a route through another set of low rounded yellow-green or mustard colored mounds.  At the margins of light the colors are brilliant.

Indeed, Death Valley is at its best in the low light of the morning and evening.  During the peak of the day, the valley can look drab.  Yet, at the edges of the day, the same vistas become spellbinding.  In Death Valley, as it often is in the desert, it’s all about the light.