Death Valley Isn’t
A Contemplation on the Thin Boundary between Adventure and Disaster
I’m bouncing around in this rented Jeep on a rocky road rising out of salty flats, headed for an exposed wind-swept alluvial fan next to a flood-zone wash, then up to a remote mountain valley with recent poignant history. I’m trying to quiet my mind, busy with the day-to-day internal chatter, unsuccessfully.
This place I’ve seen and studied from space, using freely available tools, from my kitchen at home. I’m now here, and curious how my mental model compares to reality. For fun I play the game: Tourist or Epic Hero….am I a spectator to a show, or on the Hero’s Journey awaiting transformation? As I drive, I joke and BS with my friend Bernie.
Day 1: Trek
Back up. Rewind. My good friend Bernie and I had taken a scenic route away from the comfort of our coastal valley homes. In the customary Southern California jargon we took the 101 to the 405 to the 5 to the 14. Habitually blasting north to Mammoth for a weekend of skiing, or doing some fishing near June Lake, I would hold on the 14 through the turn north-eastward in Mojave, and continue to 395 into the Owens valley, with Red Rock Canyon the primary notable waypoint, not really paying attention.
This time I’m taking it slower, the road a vertical leg between Palmdale and Mojave of an equalateral triangle formed with the San Gabriel Mountains and the Tehachapi Mountains, whose apex is just below Gorman Pass on the 5 observing the poppy fields in bloom on the hills across Antelope Valley, named after the Pronghorns who were hunted to near extinction by the 1880s.
Driving through, I wonder how many places are named after a great natural resource which is no longer there.
At least my old friends the Joshua trees seem more alive and vibrant today. Water Good! More water better! they say. And flowers are everywhere. Not large, and not always like the superbloom photos you might see elsewhere, but all over the place. For not the first time I get that The More You Look The More You See vibe. Blue skies and perfect temperatures. So nice to be out of the city.
Instead of flowing up Red Rock Canyon with nearly all the traffic, we veer straight instead, onto the Redrock Randsburg Road to the historic town of Randsburg.
Randsburg like so many abandoned old gold mine towns now has a tiny population of 69, and is weekend tourist oriented. Few businesses open. Lovely park and rest-stop area, with some old mining equipment and antique automotive fuel and oil pumps which someone moved at great effort.
That rock crusher there. Let’s stop for a moment and ponder were we are and how that thing fits. So let’s say I fought in the civil war. …and when all was said and done all I can say is I survived. By the grace of God, Damn it. And now I’m out of here…there’s nothing left. I’m heading West. And I find a hill in a desert. And near the top of that hill I find some gold dust, or silver, or borax or other ore. And I stake my claim, and file a placer claim at the county patent office and pay my fee. Now all I gotta do is extract it and ship it. But there ain’t no amazon prime. No UPS I can phone up. You think you have issues with packing tape and return authorization codes? First sweat in the hills for months to extract their precious ores, and then have to reduce and refine it to a form that could literally be put on a mule. Or maybe a wagon hauled by a mule. That means rock crushing, and probably some form of smelting to extract the base pure metal from the rock.
Those guys would have killed for a motor car…
…but the best they could do was mule-train goods from the mines back to Mojave…over the land these photos show..a 10 day journey one way.
Leaving Randsburg, we headed through Searles Valley, the feeling of the open road under a huge sky.
With flowers all over
In this valley, on this mid-April day, the yellow daisy-like flower dominates
Walking around just off the road you can see all kinds of flowers here, and in the distance. Unable to contain his inner Detectorist, Bernie finds an old can.
Heading past Trona into Panamint Valley, the scale of the place is nearly overwhelming. Look closer and then step back to see part of the Panamint Mountain range. We are headed eventually to directly on the other side of those mountains. The video below stops just south of Telescope Peak, which is the dominant landmark in both Panamint and Badwater Basin areas of Death Valley.
After a short detour across the valley floor to Ballarat for a cold drink and moonshine, an easy drive and a 30 minute delay near Town Pass over the Panamints for road construction, we made a quick pit stop in Stovepipe Wells, and then followed the standard Route 190 trip into Furnace Creek to pick up our rental Jeep.
Rental Jeep? Now, this is where things become more engaged, and some background on motivation is in order.
Sidebar: MOTIVATION
In May 2018 Bernie and I were driving up US 395 through the Owens Lake area and stopped at the sign that said “Cottonwood Kilns”. Intrigued, we drove the well-graded easy dirt road the mile or so east to what was not really that long ago close to the edge of Owens Lake and examined the Kilns, used to create charcoal to feed the nearby Mines for their smelting operations, delivering the coal by steamer ship across the lake. After inspection we continued eastward into the former lake bed to see “what was around the corner”. Rather quickly we found ourselves out of the hard-pan desert floor and into somewhat deep sand — this was, after all, the bed of a lake that was drained, and not a salt-flat which had its water evaporated. Thinking quickly, Bernie enabled his 4WD mode and we were able to turn around and get out within a couple of minutes. As we exited past the kilns I remarked that the boundary between adventure and disaster is often very thin. In our case, in a worst case scenario we could have fairly easily hiked the 1.5 miles back to 395, flagged down help, and hired a tow out of Olancha.
To put things in geographical perspective, the Owens Valley is North of Los Angeles and immediately to the east of the Sierra Nevada mountain range. You can see Mt Whitney, highest point in the contiguous United States, just to the Northwest of our location. To the East, Badwater Basin is the lowest point on the continent. In between are several formidable mountain ranges: The White Mountains & Inyos to the east of Owens Valley, then Saline & Panamints on the western edge of Death Valley, and the Amargosa Range (consisting of Grapevine, Funeral & Black Mountains) to the east. Keep going, not that far, and you end up in Lost Wages, NV.
The remains of Owens Lake, once massive, now drained to sate the thirst of Los Angeles is that whitish salt pan just to the east of the kilns. If you drive around Owens Lake, there are fascinating remnants of the once thriving 1880s when charcoal from the kilns and supplies were ferried to Keeler and thence by arial tram and mule train to the mines, while gold, silver, lead, borax and other minerals were returned to the lake from places like Saline and Panamint Valleys, as well as parts of what is now Death Valley National Park to be steamboated to Olancha where the minerals were loaded on 16-mule teams to be hauled back South toward the nearest railroad spur in Mojave.
Other ores were mule trained from larger mines directly to Mojave south through Death Valley, the most famous of which were the 20-mule team out of the Harmony and Amargosa Borax Works near Furnace Creek, associated with the 20-Mule Team Borax brand.
With this background, I found myself more and more interested in the history of the area. Coupled with a pleasant memory of a weekend spent in Saline Valley as a young man at the hot springs there, watching the first snows of the season creep down the White Mountains, I had a desire to return to the eastern valleys.
Fast forward a year, and Bernie and I are watching YouTube when, presumably after The Google incorporated our general interest in Keeler, Owens Valley and Salt & Borax from prior viewing, a recommended video came up about “The Mystery of the Death Valley Germans”.
Intrigued, we watched and were fascinated at the story of how in 1996 German tourists Egbert Rimkus, his son Georg, girlfriend Connie Meyer and her son Max from Dresden while driving through Death Valley in a minivan got stuck in an extremely remote part of the national park and died. The story took years to unfold as first they went missing, then their rented Plymouth minivan was found several miles down Anvil Canyon, and only many years later did Tom Mahood come up with a theory and searching found their remains. Tom’s account is amazing reading.
The evidence and theory indicate a sequence of minor misjudgments cascaded from a minor delay, to a major inconvenience, to a survival situation. In their case it was possibly a combination of (a) a complete misapprehension of the scale and magnitude of the location; (b) not really understanding what 125 degree heat can do quickly; (c ) a lack of preparation — in particular not enough water, and not learning enough about the roads, and (d) trusting to maps that made no real distinction between unpaved roads that are well maintained and drivable by standard 2WD vehicles, and unmaintained unpaved roads that require high-clearance 4WD. Note that even today, the standard Death Valley Guides don’t make this distinction — trusting that anyone willing to venture off the pavement is on their own and at their own risk. At core though was the nagging question: What Were They Thinking??
In watching videos to learn more about what happened, we were reminded of our own mini-encounter with the unexpected, and increasingly intrigued at the remoteness and beauty of the area.
So we decided to plan a visit. I’m including a section on Preparation at the end of this story, to document my thinking, and where I’ll provide some commentary on experience. Short version: Respect Momma Nature! These hills and roads are no joke. If you decide to go…you are on your own.
Day 1: HANAUPAH CANYON FAN
After securing and loading the Jeep, parking the car at the Furnace Creek Visitor Center, filling our emergency water supply can, and other final preparations, we headed out of town south on Badwater Road.
Our mood was good, weather was great, and getting out of the tourist mecca of Furnace Creek a relief. Having examined the maps ahead of time, and treated Google Earth like a simulator, the roads all felt familiar, and I already knew a bunch of milestones. Unlike other trips where I’m used to passing the turn, then hunting back for it, on this trip it felt like I had driven the road a dozen times. Because I had.
From Badwater Road we took West Side Road southwest through Devil’s Golfcourse (very salty) and then turned due South along the western shore of Badwater dry lake. And lake it is. The West Side Road is graded dirt, and has the feeling that it was surveyed to stay at the same altitude, more or less…so it curves around the rolling feet of the enormous alluvial fans streaming down the eastern flank of the Panamint range. The soil composition changes radically along the northern stretch between silt, salt, volcanic flow and other rocky soils, and along with it the color and feel of the road changes dramatically.
Passing Trail Canyon, we continued to Hanaupah Canyon Road, which takes a more or less direct route up the rather enormous 8-mile-long, 26 square mile alluvial fan gaining about 500 feet per mile. Starting around 240 feet below sea level, we camped about 3 miles up the road at just over 1000 feet of elevation. The view was amazing.
The slope of the fan overall is pretty unrelenting at close to 6 degrees, so we were happy to find a relatively flat spot just over three miles from the road. There was a small wash directly to our south just loaded with plants, flowers, butterflies, and caterpillars. The weather was perfect, with just a slight breeze, blue skies, and mild temperatures.
I took a walk down into the channel, which was deceptively tricky. The banks are steep, the ground loose with a 20–25 foot decent from the pavement of the fan down into the wash. I sure would not want to be there if it was raining! According to Google Earth, the road runs along this minor wash, about 1/2 mile north of the primary 1000'-wide wash draining from the canyon.
The surface of the pavement was not unlike a riverbank with large unpolished stones coalesced into a hard matrix. The clean and clear, dust free surface should have been a clue regarding the scouring power of the wind.
The evening progressed pleasantly and we enjoyed a lite dinner as the sun set, and the stars didn’t come out…
…pause for change in music….
…sky darkens…clouds thicken….
…you expect rain….. but no…
… no rain….
…but something isn’t right….
….and suddenly
BAM!
Our staked sunshade suddenly goes kiting into the air, cartwheeling up up up and away as if those metal stakes didn’t exist as a completely unforeseen blast of wind overtakes us.
After picking my jaw off the ground, I run to grab our sleeping bags and gear and per our carefully pre-arranged plan (“if anything weird happens, get into the Jeep”) we jam everything back in as fast as we possibly can to avoid losing more gear. This mostly consisted of me shuttling gear, while Bernie crammed stuff in through the tailgate window. Somewhere in this mess I lost my headlamp…which I had purchased specifically for such needs.
In retrospect, I should have taken a video while inside the Jeep just to document the experience, but at the time was more concerned about calculating the force needed to roll a Jeep when hit broadside by winds. The last forecast we had that afternoon was for 15–25 mile gusts — this felt more like 50 or 60 — it was very hard to open the car door into the wind. We had parked in East-West orientation, so the wind was hitting the car broadside. Initially we liked the idea that we had a wind shelter on the leeward side. After the rocking worsened, I decided to move the jeep to point into the wind, which stabilized the vehicle considerably. Buckling up my seat belt, I just pretended I was on a long road trip, the rocking of the car the result of travel, and drifted into a fitful sleep.
After a few hours, the winds abated sufficiently so we were able to put our pads and bags outside and get some sleep. The moon set, the Milky Way rose, and hard stars gleamed brightly against a dark dark sky.
Day 2: JOURNEY from HANAUPAH to WARM SPRINGS CAMP
By dawn, the winds were nearly non-existent, as was our sun shade. Having packed the night before, we expeditiously departed, with a much greater respect for what this terrain can dish out.
Heading down Hanaupah Canyon Fan, toward the West Side Road, we left our campsite behind. Even though this was our plan anyway, it felt a bit like a retreat, as if the mountain had issued a warning. And that creature comforts like sun shades are a joke. Later a camper who sheltered at Warm Springs Camp told us the wind had not been strong in the canyon, but that the prior night on the fan he experienced strong South-to-North winds, the opposite of what we experienced. Note to self: expect the unexpected.
As I drove, I shook off the unsettled feeling from the windy night and enjoyed the sunrise and awesome expanse of Badwater Basin. The dry lake shimmered under the rising sun, and it was easy to imagine the valley filled with water, the road hugging the shore of a large landlocked lake.
The drive on the West Side Road to Warm Springs Road was uneventful, and after the rough road and night on Hanaupah, the drive up Warm Springs was smooth and easy by comparison. First there is a long relatively straight traverse of the fan, at a much easier pitch than the route up Hanaupah, then a stretch that crosses the main wash, which is pretty fun to drive, followed by a few miles of canyon driving. Within a couple of hours we had reached the old Warm Springs mining camp.
Warm springs has lots of water, so the plants are considerably more lush.
The stream was running joyfully. If we did not know where we were headed, this would be a lovely place to camp.
After looking around, we signed the guest book, and headed up canyon toward the saddle pass into Butte Valley. The road immediately gets a bit rougher as soon as one passes the cutoff for Warm Springs Camp. Instead of a broad mostly consistent dirt road it becomes a rocky double-track with small ruts. Instead of washboarding, there’s more bobbing and weaving. Not too much exposure, and was easier than I imagined, which I attribute to the quality of the Wrangler more than my novice off-road driving skills.
Thinking about Egbert and Connie, and their Plymouth Minivan again….geeze…what were they thinking? They must have had to literally crawl up this road, their bottom scraping the occasional rock. But it is deceiving, the bad bits are separated by long stretches of comparatively easy road, and after the conditioning of Hanaupah Canyon I can see how they might have rationalized that It Really Wasn’t That Really THAT Bad, and We Are Almost There.
Day 2: BUTTE VALLEY
As we left Warm Springs Camp, the canyon walls were tight, and the road immediately told us it was no longer a low-clearance path. Within minutes we were in a warmer, buzzing, butterfly filled channel, with swarms of what looked like the same Painted Ladys that swarmed through Los Angeles a few weeks ago. If they are indicators of the wavefront of Spring, well, Spring is here in Warm Springs Canyon.
Our goal was Isa Russell’s stone cabin located at Anvil Springs in Butte Valley, also known as the Geologist’s Cabin. As we drove up Warm Springs Canyon, rounding the curves, climbing steadily, with periodic reminders of old mining activity, the canyon walls slowly but steadily mellowed until we found ourselves in a wide open “saddle” that curves around the unnamed 5000' peaks to our left, between us and Anvil Canyon. Cresting the curve we watched as Striped Butte slowly emerged, from summit to base. Then, rounding the last swichbacking curves down the entire vista of Butte Valley spread before us, Butte Valley Road a straight line pointing directly at our destination.
Stripped Butte is quite a bit of layered rock, with beautifully curved geologic time wind-etched and channeled. It’s hard to wrap my mind around the timespans of Inland Sea, Volcanic Plateau, streching chasm thinning crust and rising mountains. With the right settings, the time lapse would reveal an exceedingly dynamic environment. But human scale, here is this amazing striated ice-core-like mountain of, per USGS, “steeply tilted limestone beds of the Permian Anvil Spring Formation”
The Geologist’s Cabin is one of several “community cabins” maintained by volunteers and visitors, and available on a first-come, first-served basis. To occupy one of these cabins, visitors hoist the flag, and when vacating, lower the flag. The rule is always leave it better than you found it.
As we drove, the urge to go faster and faster to ensure we could claim our prize swelled. While we saw noone on the roads behind us, we had no idea if anyone were coming up Goler Wash and over Mengle Pass from the west. Approaching the cabin, we looked to see if anything were flying on the flagpole and were thrilled to find we had the entire valley to ourselves.
We were thrilled! We got the Cabin and after quickly unpacking and getting setup, we proceeded to sit on the back porch and chill.
Soon after our arrival, we disovered a small snake curled up in the fireplace. Bernie caught it and relocated it to the spring. We also saw Burros, rabbits, lots and lots of insects, and a coyote. I tried to make friends with some of them but only succeeded being annoying.
In the afternoon, we took a stroll up the gully behind the cabin and looked at the amazing wildflowers.
As the afternoon lazed past, we had a couple of visitors. First a father & son driving through. Later, two motorcycles guys arrived in the late afternoon and joined us for a cigar and conversation. They ended up spending the night either at Stellas or Russell’s Camp up the road a bit. Other than them, I believe we saw maybe one small convoy of 4x4s pass by on the main road heading east from Mengel Pass toward Gold Hill, and then Warm Springs.
Other than that, we had complete solitude. Aside from the animals and insects. The valley hummed, the meadows buzzed. The sound changed as the light faded.
Overall an excellent day. And no worries about wind as we had a thick stone wall between us and the weather if needed. We were tired, it had been a long day after a night of little sleep. The insects were quiet. Bernie turned in and I sat under the dark sky, the glow of Vegas lights barely visible beyond the Amargosa Range on the far side of Badwater Basin, visible through a notch in the closer hills.
Soon, the Burros returned to the Spring under a now nearly silent valley. It was time for sleep, and I dropped off almost immediately upon returning to my sleeping bag.
Day 3: Butte Valley Tour and Departure
During the night we were treated to a debate between the burros as they congregated at the spring. In the morning, the sunrise was sublime, as was sitting outside, in warm clothing, sipping on coffee.
After sunrise, we took a short drive Northwest along Coyote Canyon Road to check out the perspective, then turned around and went partway up Mengel Pass, recapitulating the route the Death Valley Germans were thought to take. It didn’t take long for the route to get much more intense, and there would have been no physical way for a Plymouth Minivan to proceed. We turned around, and were compelled to return to the Geologist’s Cabin as there were no other road.
We then took Coyote Canyon road to Willow Springs at the head of Anvil Canyon and parked. I walked up a hill to look down toward the location where they abandoned their van.
Questions swirled once again. Why did they stay on West Side Road? Why did they continue past Warm Springs? Why did they not stay at the Geologists Cabin, which has shelter, water, food and people? Why did they attempt this old washed out road? And when their car got stuck, and they found themselves in a survival situation why did they not just hike the four miles back to the Geologist’s Cabin? We know they were inside because they took the flag with them. The thinking is they thought they could escape South by reaching the China Lake military base, but the terrain in that direction is intense, with nearly no water, and absurd heat in July.
I shrugged. I had accomplished my objective. I was no closer to any real understanding of what they experienced that day. On a selfish level, I do thank them for providing the motivation to make this journey, and for the reminder of how making what seem to be reasonable choices can easily become a disaster if not prepared. And that I am not immune to that phenomenon.
Finding two large and two small rocks, I placed them on top of a bolder, wished Egbert, Georg, Connie & Max peace, and turned away.
My journey to Butte Valley was nearing its end.
Back at the cabin, we packed up, left some canned food, a new box of kitchen matches with a fresh striker, a gallon of water, two firewood logs, and a small Colman cannister of propane. We returned the furniture to the locations we found it, swept the floor and plugged the sink drain to keep the mice and rats out.
As our last tasks, we added our comments to the active Geologists Cabin Visitors journal, of which there are many going back decades, lowered and stowed the flag, then closed and latched the door.
Just as we were climbing back into our Jeep, an elderly couple arrived, the husband telling us he had been here forty years ago, and been wanting to come back since. Now he was here with his wife, checking off a bucket list item.
I can see why.
NOTES on PREPARATION
Dates of Trip: April 11–13, 2019
April 11: Drive to Death Valley, Camp on Hanaupah Fan
April 12: Drive to Butte Valley, stay in Geologists Cabin
April 13: Tour Butte Valley, drive home
Being a relative novice, this was not a casual undertaking. Many hours of planning and preparation were made, routes documented in advance, and a keen mindfulness that the best part of an adventure trip like this is returning home to our families. We had no intention of pushing our goal of reaching Butte Valley to the expense of returning safely. And unlike trips I did as a young man, where I trusted to the fates and just went for it, this time I had a detailed plan.
Note: In the photos, I tried to identify the flowers but I don’t really know my desert flowers! I’m trying to learn. So if I got it wrong please let me know and I’ll update. Note to self — next time be sure to bring the macro lens for closeups.
To get ready I’d watched a ton of YouTube videos, read some blog posts, purchased maps, and read some books.
The videos by WonderHussy are great, in particular Retracing the Final Steps of the Death Valley Germans.
The biographical account by Isa Russell, also known as Panamint Russ, is also a great read: Life on the Desert by Panamint Russ
Tom Mahood’s detailed account The Hunt for the Death Valley German is an engaging first-person read, which I highly recommend to anyone interested in the story:
The Death Valley National Park (National Geographic Trails Illustrated Map) is probably the best paper map for overall navigation
Secret Places in the Mojave Desert has a bunch of peripheral information:
The TopoMaps+ app is on my phone, and I highly recomment it:
To prepare, I downloaded a bunch of high-resolution topographic maps into my phone memory so we have those should we need — even though the plan was not to stray too far from roads. Given that Geo location works even when cell service is non-existent, we had access to high-resolution location data at all times during this trip.
Google Maps and Google Earth have been used heavily: I treated Google Maps like a simulator, so was familiar with the routes and topology. We communicated with friends who’ve traveled the area previously, talked with park rangers, and decided to rent a tricked out 4x4 designed for dirt road desert travel just to be safe.
Death Valley daily detailed weather forecasts — not perfect by any means, but at least a rough guide.
I found this Death Valley Wildflower report after our return, and it looks solid.
This year — 2019 — is not a super-bloom in Death Valley (per graph below); but flowers in higher elevations are quite nice as you can see from the photos. From what we saw this year co-oberates what the park info says: “The parts of the park at elevations between 3,000 feet — 5,000 feet are expected to have great blooms, but different species than the lower elevations of course! This will also occur later in the spring — possibly in late April. Stay tuned as we will update this page with blooming info when we get it!”
Our Jeep rental company provided us with a old SPOT unit that could be used for a daily check-in, emergency roadside help request (to them), and 911 dispatch which would invoke an S&R team, helicopter or whatever. This provided additional comfort in case of extreme needs.
Here is a 3 minute unedited video in two segments showing the drive back from Butte Valley toward Warm Springs Canyon which shows the sounds, road and general vibe of the drive. As usual, video doesn’t fully capture things, in this case the rocks sure looked larger and there were stretches requiring more turning/navigation around obstacles etc. These are two of the better condition stretches.
The More You Look The More You See.
Thanks for reading.
— Russ
Version History
April 19, 2019 published
April 19, 2019 edits: changed some references from Mules to Burros, added Bernie’s photos, minor language edit
April 21, 2019 minor edits, link formatting
April 23, 2019 fix link to Death Valley Flower Report
April 29, 2019 added Creosote Bush (Larrea tridentata) identifier to photos. Corrected description of Mt Whitney to “highest summit in the contiguous United States”
