“It’s alive and waiting for you. Ready to kill you if you go too far. The sun will get you, or the cold at night. A thousand ways the desert can kill”
The Mojave is a desert of wind, temperature extremes, Joshua Trees and solitude. When most people hear the word ‘desert,’ images of tumbleweeds, rattlesnakes and bleak desolation typically come to mind. In reality, the Mojave is anything but a wasteland. Amongst the sand and sagebrush lie many places of beauty and wonder, and of historic importance. Some are the result of time and the elements, some are the result of man and his efforts to live in the Mojave, both in recent and prehistoric times. Let’s go see what we can find.
Have you ever found yourself speeding along a lonely stretch of road in the desert, or anywhere for that matter, only to catch something out of the corner of your eye and wonder, "What in the world was that?" Do you ever take the next opportunity to turn around and go back to investigate? That's how I often discover the most interesting places on a roadtrip.
Read MoreI like Beatty. Whenever I plan a trip to Death Valley, if I'm not camping, I'll stay overnight in Beatty. The town was named after "Old Man" Montillus Murray Beatty, a Civil War veteran who bought a ranch along the Amargosa River just north of the future townsite. Over the years, it's had its share of ups and downs, seen several railroads, had its own newspaper (the Beatty Bullfrog Miner), several fancy hotels and casinos.
Read MoreAs I pulled into "town," I spotted the mill ruins off to the west of 267, up on the side of a long hill. A few other ruins were located on the east side of Scotty's Castle Road. I headed over to the mill ruins first, to see what I could find.
Read MoreIn January of 1906, John Ramsey and John "One-Eye" Thompson were on their way to the newly discovered gold strike at Harrisburg. They were forced to camp overnight near Emigrant Spring due to a blinding fog, a rare occurrence in Death Valley. The next morning, the fog was gone and the two men noticed some nearby ledges that looked promising. After a quick survey of the ledges, they decided to forgo traveling to Harrisburg, as they promptly located several claims in the area. This was the beginning of the Gold Eagle Group and the beginning of the mining camp that became Skidoo.
Read MoreIt was back in July of 1905 that Pete Aguereberry and Shorty Harris ran into each other at the Furnace Creek Ranch, and possibly due to the heat, decided to head up into the Panamints to do some prospecting. When they arrived on the open plateau now known as Harrisburg Flats, one of the men (each of course claiming discovery) saw something that attracted his eye on the north side of a low, long hill. Pulling out a pick and chipping off a sample, the material contained free gold. The two men divided up the outcroppings, with Harris taking claims on the south side of the ridge and Aguereberry staking claims on the north side. They came up with a name for the camp which was sure to boom on the site, they called it "Harrisberry."
Read MoreAguereberry Point is flat out a contender for the most stunning view in Death Valley National Park. It’s not the highest point in the park, nor the most visited, but it is certainly worth the time to visit.
Read MoreSo after surviving my near death experience at Mesquite Flat (read about it HERE), I was looking for higher altitudes, cooler climate and less hiking. I was driving up Emigrant Canyon Road, on my way to the ghost town of Harrisburg and the remains of the Eureka Mine. I'd been up this road before a couple years earlier, when I visited the Wildrose Charcoal Kilns, and I remembered seeing several spots that needed further exploration the next time I was in the area. So I was in the area, and I caught sight of these two large tanks; I pulled over to investigate and I'm glad I did.
Read MoreIt was October. It was around 10:00 am in the morning and I had just pulled into the main parking area for Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes. It was a mild October morning, the temperature was in the mid-80s. A light breeze was blowing. A nice day for a walk in the dunes. So I packed some water, put on my hat and commenced sand walking.
Read MoreThe "wells" were originally two shallow pits dug into the sandy floor of the valley basin. With the mining booms of Rhyolite, Nevada and Skidoo, the wells were a natural stopping point between the two camps. Stage and freight service between the two began in 1906 and by the following year, a small settlement had grown on the site. It was also the location of the first telephone office in the valley. J.R. Clark, a superintendent of construction on the Rhyolite-Skidoo road reported that Stovepipe Wells then consisted of a commissary tent, a boarding house, several additional tents, a corral and feeding stable and "accommodations in every respect for pilgrims crossing the hot sands. The spring is now inclosed and the water is consequently much improved."
Read MoreDublin Gulch is located on the southern edge of Shoshone, California. I wasn't able to track down a lot of history on the place, but here are some generalities which are most likely accurate. The caves are dug into solidified volcanic ash that reportedly came from a Lava Creek eruption in Yellow Stone National Park, over 600 thousand years ago. One account claims they were dug in the early 1900s, another puts their creation during the late 1870s when a silver boom at the nearby Noonday Mines was in full swing. Regardless of when they were created, they are pretty amazing.
Read MoreThe Mojave Cross stands atop Sunrise Rock, a granite outcropping located adjacent to Cima Road, approximately six miles north of Cima, Cal. The present cross is not the original, however and therein lies the story.
The original Mojave Cross was erected in 1934, as a memorial to those who had died in WWI. One of the founders of the memorial, and a veteran of WWI, Riley Bembry took care of the cross until his death in 1984. Shortly before he died, Bembry asked his close friend, Henry Sandoz, to watch over the memorial after he was gone. Which Sandoz and his wife have done since that time.
Read MoreRhyolite, Nevada is one of my favorite ghost towns, so much so that when I'm even remotely in the area, I'll stop by to visit and take more pictures for my collection. There is something intangible about the place that lures visitors in from all over the world. Ghosts? Yes, there are ghosts in Rhyolite.
Read MoreGetting to Darwin Falls is kind of a two-part adventure. The first part being the last few miles of the drive to the trailhead. It's a bumpy, rocky road that takes you through some pretty canyons and washes. The second part of the adventure is the hike to the falls, and I enjoyed that a lot more than the first part. Wasn't quite as jarring to my internal organs....
Read MoreRuth Camp is an interesting ghosttown, located approximately 14 miles north of Trona in the Argus Mountain Range. There are a good number of fairly well-preserved buildings that I was able to poke around in, which date from the late 1930s. Most have been vandalized over the years and the contents pretty much trashed, but it was still fun checking them out.
Read MoreI had just left the neat little ghost town of Ruth's Camp and was heading north on the Trona Wildrose Road. My plan was to stop at Ballarat and then continue north, connecting with CSR 190 and thence to Lone Pine to spend the night. I made it as far as Ballarat, where I discovered that the road ahead was closed due to being washed out during the most recent flash floods. Ballarat now had my full attention.
Read MoreI’d seen pictures of the Wildrose Charcoal Kilns in Death Valley many years ago and had put them on my list of places to visit. Unfortunately, the time between adding them to my ever-growing list and then actually making the trek to see them was a good number of years. But when something turns out to be even more impressive that you thought it would, it more than makes up for the wait. And that was the case with these crazy dome things out in the wilderness of Death Valley.
Read MoreJoshua Tree National Park, the California Gold Country, forgotten places in the Mojave Desert. These are a few of my favorite things.
