February Travels 2015

We headed out February 1 for a two week adventure.  I already posted our first hike to Darwin Falls.  That evening I was trying to upload photos and compose from my tablet and exceeded my data plan.  Bumped off the internet until Feb 25 !!! Oh the frustration, I called and it was a third party provider and there was nothing I could do.  So I set aside the tablet and phone and concentrated on my camera and the sights before me.  It took about a week for me to detox from Social Media and let go the need to be connected to ??? Kim Kardashian? Obama? ISIS? This is really the biggest reason I love to get away and travel.

So what did we see, we went to the Visitors Center and found that Death Valley NP was celebrating the 150 Anniversary of Nation Parks by encouraging folks to hike Death Valley.  They had a list of popular hikes and assigned points based on difficulty and distance, after earning points you got a limited edition sticker.  You had to take photos of your self to prove you completed the hikes.  We were hooked!  We planned our adventure with good friends Jaquie and Phil Ansell, and Phil is a hiking fool, so give him a challenge and he is off and running.  Darwin was on the list so we had already earned 1 point.  We decided to hike to the top of the Mesquite Dunes, 2.3 miles round trip, it was harder than it looks.  Hiking on sand was slow but so worth it.  We were beyond all of the footprints left by most of the visitors and had pristine dunes all to ourselves.

The dunes are pretty amazing.

We fell into a nice routine, hike during the day, get a pool pass from Furnace Creek Ranch and swim/shower then relax around camp.  We had some amazing gourmet dinners; stuffed pork chops, Georges' famous tri-tip, BBQ chicken and steaks grilled to perfection.  Then relax around the camp fire.

There was a rain storm a couple of days before we arrived and some of the roads were washed out.  I wanted to visit Titus Canyon, a long one-way road through some rugged area.  The road was washed out and closed so we opted to hike The Narrows, about 1.5 miles of narrow canyon.  Easy hike on the graded road but pretty steep.  Glad we hiked it, I don't think you get the same effect driving.

The next day we heard through the park grapevine, Titus Canyon was opened and freshly graded, so off we went.  The highlight was the herd of four Bighorn Mountain Sheep we saw.

We needed a few more points to get our stickers, a hike up to Red Cathedral earned us another one.

And my favorite place, Salt Creek in the afternoon.  The lighting was perfect and the colors were beautiful.  We extended the hike into the badlands around Salt Creek, discovered a mylar balloon, and more beauty.

On our final day we decided to take it easy and attended a flint napping class put on by Death Valley Joe, a Park volunteer.  He recommended that we have lunch at the fancy Furnace Creek Inn, the Parks posh hotel, starting at $345 per night.  Lunch was a very good Crab Louie (in Death Valley haha).  We then started getting ready to move to Valley of Fire State Park in the morning.

At Furnace Creek Inn

Petroglyphs

Salt Creek Badlands