Spring Break 2008: Death Valley!

On Thursday night around 6, Stephanie and I started driving towards Death Valley. We made it as far as Mojave. I think it was close to midnight when we stopped at a Motel 6 to sleep. We set our alarm for 8 the next morning, but we both woke up before it went off. We took what would be our last shower until we got back Sunday night, and then continued on our way, getting to the Furnace Creek Visitor Center before noon on Friday.

Map from San Francisco to Death Valley National Park

Our first mission was to find a campsite (we’d made no reservation in advance). To our dismay, the main Furnace Creek campground was full. We continued just up the road and luckily found a spot at the nearly full Texas Spring campground. It’s always unsettling trying to find and then stake a claim on a first-come, first-serve campsite when few are available, but we managed to pay our fee, clamped our receipt to the pole marking our site, and began to set up our tent to mark our territory.

Here are some photos from the first leg of our adventure:

Butterfly guts on our windshield
My view from Mojave to Death Valley: yellow butterfly guts
The east side of the Sierra Nevadas
Sierra Nevadas, eastside
Salt beds to the east of the Sierra Nevadas
Striking salt beds in the valley east of the Sierras
Gasoline price-gouging in Panamint Valley, prices in nearby Death Valley were 50 cents/gallon cheaper
Gouging?
The road cutting across Panamint Valley
The road across Panamint Valley (also below sea level)
Our Texas Springs campsite
Our home for the next two nights
Stephanie and Justin at Texas Spring campground
Your desert campers

Here are links to the other parts of our adventure:

7 Comments

d.e..s…o….l…..a……t…….e…….. :)

chris

My Justin, I can’t wait to know more about your adventure because it sounds very unusual !!!! Many kisses from moumounette

Bri/Dad

Having never camped in the desert I was wondering if you could add more about the actual experience – for example, temperature range, humidity, cloud cover, sun screen used, all those things that another camper would need if they tried it themselves.

chris and dad, fear not, we took over 500 photos in the span of 3 days, so I’ve got a few more posts up my sleeve.

Bri/Dad

spoke too soon… thanks for the next post.

They keep coming, I just posted photos from Badwater Basin.

joe chien

Hi Justin, we don’t know each other but I came upon your site when I was searching for the right campsite on the internet. I’ve read some reviews that claim that texas spring campsite is reall awesome. Basically it is said that the camp site is on a small hill, overlooking the Furnace Creek and with lots of SHADE and privacy. That’s exactly what we are looking for. What is your impression of that?

Looking forward to hear back from you!
joechien0218@yahoo.com

thx a bunch man!

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