Death Valley National Park

Several years ago I thought it would be great to visit Death Valley National Park over Thanksgiving weekend. We are big fans of the NPS, but August, our big travel time, is the worst time to go to this desert. We waited too long to make reservations then, so this time I was on it early, and booked a little room in Panamint Springs on the far western edge of the park.

It doesn't take too long to get there from here - just about 4.5 hours, and we arrived a little too early to check in. The closest attraction is a little hike to Darwin Falls which requires a bit of rock scrambling over wet places, but at the end of the hike is this sweet little falls.

I think one can feel as though you've seen the best parts of the park if you spend two full days there. Of course, if you go when it is fall/winter, those days are short with the sun setting at 5. We spent the first day from the middle of the park heading south. 

The first thing we came to were the Mesquite Flat Dunes - and we took our time tromping through the sand and taking photos.

After a stop at the new visitor's center at Furnace Creek (with a lovely new movie to tell about the park), we headed to a popular overlook at Zabriskie Point, looking west over the valley.

We decided not to take the walk down into the canyon here, mostly because we did not want to hike back up.

Further down the road we took a little walk to the Natural Bridge through a narrow canyon.

The farthest south and the lowest point we reached is what people think about when someone mentions Death Valley - the Badwater Basin Salt Flats. It's the lowest point in North America at 282 feet below sea level.

Heading north again, we took the one-way loop through Artist's Drive and saw the Artist's Palette - lovely-colored hills of pastels.

So, our understanding of the park is that there is plenty to see, but it also involves quite a bit of driving. Many of the places are accessible once you drive 2-3 miles on gravel roads, and then you walk for 1/2 mile or more. We did not take our usual 4-mile hike in the morning on this trip, but we did get to see many beautiful things.