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<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 When I told people that\u00a0I wanted to go to Death Valley, they asked why?\u00a0 \u00a0I wasn\u2019t really sure.\u00a0 I had heard that it had recently reclaimed the honor of the hottest place IN THE WORLD, wresting\u00a0the title from Libya \u2013 134 degrees!\u00a0 As I prepared\u00a0to make the trip I knew from watching the temperatures that it wasn\u2019t going to be\u00a0that hot, but I wondered what life in Death Valley under such extreme temperatures was like.\u00a0 I thought it would be interesting to write about the extreme heat and how the flora, fauna and humans survived it.\u00a0 I thought I\u2019d be using the term \u2018buzzard hot\u2019\u00a0many times.\u00a0 I was even going to bring\u00a0an egg along to fry on a sidewalk.\u00a0 To be honest, I thought I would mostly make fun, or at least make a number of \u2018hot jokes\u2019 about this seemingly god-forsaken place.\u00a0 Those who have been there know the reality I was about to learn.<\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I hit the road at 5:00 a.m. and got into Baker at 7:30.\u00a0 I used to think that Baker was in the middle of nowhere, until I turned onto\u00a0Highway 127 and headed north \u2013 Baker became a thriving metropolis.\u00a0 After driving less than an hour, I thought I was in that giant warehouse in New Mexico where they filmed the \u2018fake moon landing\u2019.\u00a0 There was nothing in the distance but Mojave Desert for as far as the eyes could see \u2013 no other cars, no road signs, not even a shoulder on the road, just a narrow two-lane road winding through the desert.\u00a0 It\u2019s a place where you really have to trust your car not to break down.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0As I got closer to Death Valley the names of the towns and points of interest reminded me of just how hot it was getting outside \u2013 Furnace Creek, Hell\u2019s Gate, Dante\u2019s View, Stovepipe Wells, Charcoal Kilns, Burning Wagon Point.\u00a0 I arrive at the Death Valley Visitor Center to get recommendations for what I should see and do.\u00a0 At the top of the list was Scotty\u2019s Castle (top photo) \u2013 another 50 miles to the north.\u00a0 I got back in the car and got back on the road \u2013 it was 11:00 and the temperature just broke 100.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The story surrounding the building of Scotty\u2019s Castle in the middle of nowhere is a fascinating one.\u00a0 Built in the 1920s, this architectural wonder featured a one million gallon swimming pool, an elaborate heating and air conditioning system which was way ahead of its time, an innovative hydro-electric power system driven by a desert spring that still delivers 300 gallons of water per minute, AND a solar panel, yes a solar panel built in\u00a0the 20s!\u00a0 Just as interesting as the house itself is the story of the two key characters responsible for its construction \u2013 Albert Johnson, the wealthy, Cornell educated engineer who longed to be a \u2018cowboy\u2019 and Walter Scott (Scotty), a con man who left home at the age of 11, moved to the desert as a teenager and eventually started selling shares\u00a0of bogus gold mines to wealthy easterners, Johnson being one of them.\u00a0 How they formed a life-long friendship is something you\u2019ll have to read on your own.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 After Scotty\u2019s Castle I had to get to Badwater; it\u2019s just a field of encrusted salt, but it\u2019s \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 My most memorable drive was coming back from Badwater; a loop off the main road appropriately called Artists Palette, it is a narrow, one-way drive cut through the mountain that shows colors you\u2019ve never seen before \u2013 it is surreal.\u00a0 It underscored to me the most surprising part of my desert experience \u2013 the sheer beauty of the place, and I was told that the springtime is really<\/em>\u00a0beautiful.\u00a0 Everywhere I drove there were beautifully colored mountains on each side of me \u2013 chocolate brown to cream-colored, cobalt blue, sage green, every shade of red and orange.\u00a0 And they all changed hues from sunrise\u00a0to sunset.<\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Death Valley – why?\u00a0 The shapes, the textures, the colors can be\u00a0seen nowhere else on the planet; it\u00a0should be renamed the Painted Desert \u2013 it is truly magnificent.<\/p>\n \n \n \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Bob Sparrow \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 When I told people that\u00a0I wanted to go to Death Valley, they asked why?\u00a0 \u00a0I wasn\u2019t really sure.\u00a0 I had heard that it had recently reclaimed the honor of the hottest place IN THE WORLD, wresting\u00a0the … read more<\/a>I soon\u00a0came upon\u00a0Dumont Dunes (left) \u2013 real live sand dunes, just like you see in the movies, but without the camels.\u00a0 My car is not an All-Terrain Vehicle, but I pretended that it was and drove off the road to get a better look at the dunes. (photo below, yes that little speck is my car).\u00a0 At the junction of Highway 127 and Highway 190, I arrive at the bustling burg of Shoshone, population 31, I didn\u2019t see one of them.\u00a0 I was hoping to get gas here, but as you can see from the picture below,<\/a>\u00a0the car in front of me was taking quite a while to fill up, so I <\/a>moved on .<\/p>\n<\/a>\u00a0the lowest place in the Western Hemisphere \u2013 282 feet below sea level.\u00a0 Part of the reason I wanted to get to this historical location\u00a0was just to breathe the air; I thought if high altitude creates thin air which is hard to breathe, then low altitudes must create \u2018thick\u2019 air \u2013 which logically would be easier to breathe.\u00a0 I\u2019m here to tell you I couldn\u2019t tell the difference between sea level air and below sea level air.<\/p>\n<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I then drove out to Zabriskie Point just before sundown and my photos just don\u2019t capture what one feels when taking in everything that nature has done to this terrain.<\/p>\n