Death Valley (via Slippy Jenkins)
Things I learned in Death Valley this weekend:
1. The hottest time of day in Death Valley is 5PM. It got up to 122 Degrees on Saturday.
2. You shouldn’t drive with a water bottle between your legs, because when you drive over a hill and see an RV coming at you on the other side of the road, it’s a little freaky, and you might swerve off the road. The water bottle makes maneuvering the car kind of difficult.
3. There are 30 different species of reptile in Death Valley.
4. One of the rangers said they threw a slip and slide party up in the mountains where some of the other rangers live. They didn’t drink beer that night because it was still around 100 degrees when the sun went down.
5. Gas in Death Valley cost me 6.57 per gallon. And that’s the 87 octane cheap stuff.
6. According to my GPS, the shortest distance from LA to DV wasn’t exactly the fastest. This was true. I don’t know why I felt I needed to prove my GPS wrong.
7. You cannot hike in DV during the summer.
8. There is something Borax in Death Valley. It’s some type of salt and supposedly it’s a big deal.
9. You can drive from DV to LV in four hours, and we did that.
10. There weren’t a lot of people there on Saturday, and the ones who were didn’t speak any English. Lots of Germans. Come to think of it, we didn’t speak to any English-speaking people there besides the rangers. Probably because Americans aren’t stupid enough to go to Death Valley during a heat wave. Bill and I have always been different like that.
11. You should never leave your car for more than 10 minutes, because stepping into your black car with black leather is going to suck when it’s been baking in 120 degree weather.
12. There are snails living in Badwater.
13. While beautiful, I don’t think I’ll be back there soon.
In case you missed it, here are some of the pictures I took while visiting.
4 months ago