2005 Death Valley Solo Trip

My wife and friends work.  I'm retired.

The more I think about it the more I think I ought to go.  This could be my very first open ended vacation!!  Always before I have had to be back at a certain time.  This time I can play it by ear.  I have read that this is the wettest winter in the ninety years of recorded Death Valley Monument history and the spring flowers should be spectacular!

Also, during Winter Break, I heard about a cabin located somewhere in Confidence Wash.  My friend Jeff in Shoshone said he would try to find a map of it and let me know.  Another guy named Plum, who I have never met except via e-mail, has sent me some interesting Death Valley locations to check out.  There is a lot to do, starting with, getting in shape.

I have been walking every day.  I dug out my old Kelty backpack and have started wearing it and adding a bit of weight to it.  My neighbor Tawny and I have been going for walks and picking up trash along the Greenwood/Philo Road.  I have been hauling the trash home in my back pack.  Over time we have gradually increased our walks to five miles and my pack weight up to around twenty pounds.

Another friend, Erica, who is an avid backpacker, told me about Ray Jardine's book about lightweight backpacking.  I bought a copy and got some good ideas.

And I read, "Between a Rock and a Hard Place", by Aron Ralston about him being on a day hike through a slot canyon in Southern Utah.  He is the guy who had a rock roll and pin his right hand against the canyon wall.  His story is a very good reminder for me to always keep people informed about where I am and what my plans are while out in the vast wilderness.

Lolli is excited about me and my plans.  I left some blank checks with my neighbors, they will pick up my mail and deal with my few bills that come in.  I think I have everything covered.

February 16.  I turn and cast one last look at dingyHovel, hop into my Vanagon, and head up the road.

Wham!

Driving over a small water bar in the drive up to the gate something sounded like the bottom of the Vanagon was hit with a sledgehammer!  I stop and take a look and discover my lower left ball joint blew out!!  Unbelievable!  Here I am, finally ready for the trip of my lifetime, and I break down within a quarter mile of my home!!  I sit there and ponder my situation.  Should I forget the whole thing? Just stay home and build model airplanes?  I take another look at the ball joint.  Maybe I can drive it to Ukiah and get it fixed if I drive real careful; don't hit any bumps.  I grab my cell phone and call Big O Tires in Ukiah.  "Do you guys do ball joints on a 1984 Vanagon?"

"Yup."

"I'm on my way."

One hour to Ukiah, three hours in the shop, $375.00 bucks later and I am good to go!!   In the late afternoon, during my drive past Clearlake, I spot a vehicle I have never seen before.

   

I met the owner and he tells me it is a Corwin.  Electric powered.  Quite nicely done.

By nightfall I am camping at Walker Ridge in the steadily falling rain!

February 17

I reach the Central Valley and the almond trees are in blossom!!  Yes!

During the long drive south on I-5 the monotony is broken when I spot a crew doing transmission tower repair.  Believe it or not there are four guys in the stage below the helicopter.  I watched the pilot of the helicopter hover the stage at one location while work was being done and now they are being moved to another location!!  I wonder what that job pays!!

By nightfall I am over Tehachapi Pass and camped east of Mojave.

In the morning I visit my doggie Sarah's grave.  Her dog dish and dog ball are still there.  All the rain makes the desert very lush.

North of Baker I drive past Silverlake.  Normally this is a dry lake with a road straight across it.  Now it if full to the brim!

Further on I pass the Dumont Dunes and see something that compels me to turn around, go back, and take a photo.

Someone got their big motor home stuck in the sand and there are three, count 'em, three vehicles hooking up with nylon straps to pull him out!  And, by golly, they did it!  Quite entertaining!

In the afternoon I arrive at my first destination, Rhoades Cabin.  A rain shower and rainbow greet me.

A guy by the name of Jon is already staying in the cabin but that is fine with me.  I camp in my Vanagon.  We end up staying at Rhoades five days and hiked to various places of interest around the area.  Jon is retired from the Death Valley Park Service and although totally deaf he is very interesting to be around.  A really nice guy.

One day I drive to Tecopa for a hot tub.  The washes are running with water.

One result of all this rain is my introduction to the Death Valley mosquito!!  They are about four times the size of the Alaskan mosquito but they don't seem to know what to do with the rarely encountered human!  Not one has managed to bite me!  Yet!

Each day, during my stay at Rhoades I would look at the peak to the south and study it through my binoculars.  When we were here during Winter Break our friend Robert from Ithaca, New York hiked up to the top of that peak.  He made it seem easy.  Now I have it in my mind to do the same.  Finally a rain free day arrives and I decide to go for it.  The yellow mark on the above photo shows my planned route.

Yes!  I did it!!  When I later told Lolli, via cell phone, about my accomplishment I told her it took me five hour and twenty minutes round trip!  She laughed and said, "It only took Robert twenty minutes!"

  Shessh!

Anyway, I feel I did pretty good for an old fart.

One thing about the unsettled weather, it sure can be beautiful.

From "Robert's Peak" I could see the Amargosa River meandering in the southern end of Death Valley and I decided to go there next.

On my way, via the Harry Wade Route, a Raven kept an eye on me.

I camped where the road crosses the Amargosa.  I didn't see any need to try crossing it and getting my brakes full of highly salty water although I did see a Ford Expedition go across.  I met a young couple with two young boys who were hiking and tent camping.  The boys were around six and four and hiked right along with their mom and dad.  At night they all wore their headlamps during dinner.  I heard no whining or sniveling or complaints about missing their Nintendo.  Great kids.  Wonderful parents.  Hi James, Ellie, Zach and Luke!

In the morning the sunrise on the Panamint Mountains was spectacular.

   

Driving along the floor of the valley the flowers just got better and better!

My next "project".  Visit the Ashford Mine.

Everybody stops and visits the Ashford Mill which is just off the highway going to Badwater but few visit the mine that supplied the mill.  In the above photo is where I camped overnight. The small brown rock hills above the Vanagon are where I parked to start my hike.  The yellow arrow points to the canyon entrance.  This little jaunt took me seven hours and forty minutes round trip!  Pretty good elevation change too.  I felt like I had put in a day by the end of it.  I wound up walking along with a "semi-retired" couple from Las Vegas who had a six month old Brittney Spaniel, "Hana", with them.  Great dog!  Having those folks to talk to, while walking, helped take my mind off my aches and pains!

   

At the mining camp there were three building but they are pretty torn up.  Various mine shafts and some old equipment lying around.

I spend the night back in my Vanagon resting on my laurels!

February 28th

Off to Pahrump, Nevada for supplies, groceries, gas, water and, by golly, I find a Wi-Fi hot spot and download 293 e-mails and upload some photos to my friends.  E-ha!

March 1st

My next project.  Find the Confidence Wash cave/cabin I have heard about.

I leave highway 178 and drive the 4X4 road up to the saddle where the park service has blocked the road.  Close enough.  I should be within three and a half miles of the cabin.

My plan is to do an overnight backpack trip to the cabin but first I want to do a short trip down the wash to see what I am up against.  Taking my geocaching geek bag, lunch, water, camera, and binoculars I head down the wash.  About half way to where the cabin should be I come across a mine.

   

I assume this was part of the Confidence Mill operation.  Several shafts and some old equipment but no cabins that I see.

On my hike back up to the Vanagon a lizard keeps an eye on me.

I spend the night at the Vanagon and wait till morning to see what the weather looks like.

March 2nd.

It's a go.

It is mostly a process of following an old road that is now closed.  In places it is quite evident and in some places, where it crosses washes, it disappears but the general idea is down, down, down.

Two and a half hours of hiking and I find it!

   

Pretty darn cool!

There are gallon jugs of water with an iodine taste.  One can of pork and beans.  Some candles, a knife, spoon and fork.  Some pots and pans.

Some magazines:

1972 Reader's Digest * 1972 Fall & Winter Montgomery Ward Catalogue * 1977 May edition of Popular Mechanics
1981 Gander Mountain Catalogue * 1981 July edition of Outdoor Life * 1986 Oregonian Newspaper (Friday October 3)

I discover the 1977 Ford Thunderbird is selling for just over five thousand dollars.
And I read that Nixon is visiting Russia for Nuclear Arms Reduction talks.

On a table in the cabin was a large brown shopping bag.  On it was written:

......1981 April 28.....
These dugouts built
in 1935 by W.F.Lattimer
John Walker and
Sid Barbour
........................... W.E.Lattimer (son)

I unroll my sleeping bag and settle in for the night.

I think I caught a brief glimpse of some old desert rat in the mirror hanging on the wall!!

I cook supper on my little tin can stove, read the magazines a while but soon darkness arrives and it is time to face a night of sleeping on the rusty springs of the old bed; what a racket each time I move.  But I finally nod off.

2:00 AM and I wake to some scratching noise in my backpack!!  I get up and find this guy trying to get my Reese's Peanut Butter Cup out of the side pocket of my backpack!

Morning!  Thank god it's morning!  I have oat meal cooking on my tin can stove, the mouse has gone back into hiding and I am off of that squeaky bed!  Life is good!  It is 57 degrees outside but inside the cabin it stayed a constant 63 degrees!

Time to pack up and head for the Vanagon!

Up and up the hill I go.

My Vanagon waiting for me at the saddle looks great.  Home again.  Home again!

I have come to realize it takes a few days, or more, to get the feel of a place.  And a  few days for the wild life to become used to me.

I set up camp three miles up the old Furnace Creek road and settled in for a while.  I spent my days wandering around with my Audubon Desert Flower guide in hand and tried to learn the names of some of what I have been looking at.

   

Here, on the left, is Chicory and, on the right, one I got a kick out of, Filaree Storksbill.
Named for the vertical pointed, green, "storks bills".

Chia

Mojave Aster ?

And by golly, it was true.  The third day at my camp spot a Say's Phoebe flew inside my Vanagon, perched on the steering wheel and check things out wondering if maybe this would be a good place for a nest!  Its mate hovered around outside waiting for the results of her survey.  I think they really like my Vanagon but weren't too sure about me and decided against moving in.

Here are my resident pair of Ravens.  I put out some tortilla bits and although they almost immediately flew over and checked them out it took them two days to work up their nerve to actually grab one and fly off with it.  Having recently read "The Mind of the Raven" and "Raven's in Winter" I knew what to watch for.  The female did reveal herself by doing the knocking call; males don't..  They were extremely wary of the tortilla bits and did frequent fly-overs and much standing around on various rocks around the perimeter, calling and carrying on.  Finally, the second afternoon a series of hovers right over the bits with four quick touch downs and immediate take-off before finally grabbing one tortilla bit and taking it away to their favorite perch on the hill.  The next day I did an extended hike up into the hills and when I got back the tortilla bits were gone!

The extended hike up the hill yielded an unexpected find.  When the sun started setting and the shadows got long the desert erupted with white flowers so thick I could not walk without stepping on them.  Just a half hour before, where the sun was shining on this location, yellow flowers had been predominate!!

   

??? and Indian Paintbrush.

And then, there are times I am stumped.  I saw this laying on the ground and thought it was a shiny seed.  I picked it up, put it on my topo map, and one end wiggled!!

Note.  My friend Phill e-mailed me to tell me this unknown object;
 "...is a pupa. Probably will emerge later as a butterfly or moth. It was a caterpillar before it became a pupa.
The pupa is the stage where the immature insect changes into the adult."

Thanks Phill

I finally packed up and moved on up Furnace Creek to check out the town site of Greenwater.

   

Not much left of this mining town except a post with a bunch of old cans and wires and metal bands and a sign saying,
"Welcome to Greenwater".

A hike into a rather remote location rewarded me with Indian rock art.

   

And everywhere I go the wildlife keeps an eye on me!!

I attempted a drive out to Gold Valley but the last bit of road over the pass was rough enough to discourage me so I gave that idea up and turn around but the flowers along the way were spectacular.

After a week of banging around along the Furnace Creek road I decided to head for Pahrump, Nevada for groceries and gas.  Parallel to the Furnace Creek road in places were these strange tracks.  I learned from my friend Jeff in Shoshone that these tracks were made by army tanks when General Patton's group was training in this area around sixty years ago!

In Pahrump I topped off my water, bought groceries and filled the gas tank.  Then stopped by the hobby shop to see if the owner knew any of the folks Lolli and I had met during our 2004 Winter Break, the folks that were flying at that dry lake north of Baker.  He said "Sure, they are probably out at the field right now" and drew me a map of how to get there.

   

I ended up camping at the flying field two nights!  On Saturday around twenty-five folks came out and spent most of the day flying!!  A great bunch of folks.  The guys on the right are a dad, a son and two cousins.  All with trainers and just getting started.

 

Snow capped Mt. Charleston off in the distance.  40 degrees at night and 85 during the day.  I clamp my windshield sunscreen on the side of the Vanagon to cover the area where the refrigerator is located to keep the intense heat of the sun off.  It helps a lot.

One evening a guy showed up with a 1/8ths scale dune buggy.

   

It is powered by a weed eater type engine and really scoots!

Okay.  Sunday March 13.  My laundry is done and it is time to head back to the peace and quiet.

As it warms up the flowers just get better and better.  Here is a nice cluster of Indian Paintbrush.  It seems where ever the Paintbrush are located there are always little white flowers mixed in with them.

   

This past week I spent  four days and hiked a total of twenty miles looking for an Indian cave I heard about.  The location is kept quiet because it is a rather complete, undisturbed, site with Pictographs, metates, and obsidian chips.  I was told there would be water catchment basins near the site.  I found water catchment basins and various canyons that were, for me, dead ends because of dry falls.  I searched the slopes of the surrounding hills until I got into such steep areas that I was starting to scare myself.  I had to give up but I did get a lot of exercise!

Along the way I did see petroglyphs.

   

In various places the spring flowers are quite spectacular but I started to notice that almost everywhere there are very small flowers that go almost un-noticed!  I got out my tape measure and photographed some of the varieties that are basically, underfoot!!

They are most amazing.

Driving along Furnace Creek road I noticed what looked like a small building way off in the distance up on the hill side.  I drove within a mile and a half, got out my walking stick and fanny pack containing munchies, water and snake bite kit (I have not see one snake.  Yet.)  And took a hike.

I finally arrived at the "small building" which turned out to be an early nineteen fifties Ford truck.  It had been hammered and vandalized and used for target practice but near the truck was the remains of a small mining operation.

      

There were several mine shafts going straight down.  Beside one was a pile of ore with a lot of copper content, the turquoise blue.

   

The hike to and from the Ford truck and mine site was rewarding with patches of more flowers.

At various sites along the Furnace Creek road and almost any place where mining activity took place there are tin can dumps.

   

Back on the highway near Salisbury Pass I noticed an interesting rock outcropping with lots of holes and small caves in it.  I hiked up to take a look and inside one hole (the photo on the the left with the red arrow) I discovered a bird nest made of small sticks.  Inside the nest, these four eggs!!  I took a photo of the eggs and then put the eggs back hoping the mom won't be discouraged from completing the incubation process.

   

Back on the highway heading towards Death Valley I saw the flowers were even more spectacular than they had been several weeks earlier.  People were pulling over to the side of the highway all along this area and wandering around looking at the flowers and taking photos.  And then I saw some kind of film outfit set up with all their equipment, generator running, story board and huge camera on a huge tripod.  A crew of people were involved setting things up and waiting for a sun break or better lighting.  Probably, "Film at eleven" about the wildflowers in Death Valley.

   

And just a bit further on there were more cars pulled over to the side and even a tour bus.  Folks are coming by the hundreds, possibly thousands to see this once in a lifetime spring bloom!

I decided to avoid the fray and return to Rhoades Cabin.  I discover the Desert Five Spot are now blooming at this elevation.

In the evening the sun peeked out over the Panamint Range and side lit the desert and hills by Rhoades Cabin.  A beautiful, peaceful close to an interesting week.

I am starting to get weighed down with my heavy thinking and pondering and relentless search for the Indian cave nobody talks about!!

During the past three weeks I have invested eight days and nights and hiked over thirty miles looking for the cave.  It has been good exercise and interesting country but towards the end the hikes were ranging out five miles, spending four hours of climbing and searching the canyons and five miles back to the Vanagon.  I was becoming one tired puppy!!

Yet, there is always the hope I might find it at the end of the rainbow.

And finally....

  

I did!!!

Pictographs!  Painted Indian Art!

   

   

Deer and sheep and other markings I have no idea about.

Even a base rock metate and various rock chips!

And, of course, a Say's Phoebe building her nest in a cavity in the ceiling!!

I returned the next day to do a watercolor of some of the art and even knowing where it is located I still ended up going the wrong way!  This cave is an amazing puzzle that even when solved isn't easy to find.  And I am happy about that.  There were no foot prints on the trail and none at the cave.  I removed my footprints when I left.  Best kept secrets are best..., kept secret.

Another interesting object I encountered is what some call a Geolyth.
It is a pattern of rocks which I am told was probably arranged by Indians because there is a build up of desert varnish on the rocks indicating they have been in this arrangement a long, long time.

And of course, the flowers.

   

These caught my attention because there are thousands of yellow centered flowers, like the one on the left, but those with a red spot in the center are quite rare.

March 22

I am now ready to tackle my next project and it is located in Panamint Valley, the next valley west of Death Valley.

Crossing the Death Valley floor heading for the Panamint I notice the wind was kicking up huge clouds of dust in the Badwater area. I got out my Kestrel wind gauge and clocked wind gusts to 40 mph with an average of 35 mph!  Thousands and thousands of daisies blowing in the wind.

When I arrived at Stovepipe Wells the wind slacked off and I saw the vehicle of my dreams!

Oh boy, oh boy, if I ever win the lottery.........

Well......  If cows could fly.........

Actually, with a huge camper like that I would never get into the places I go with my Vanagon.
I'm happy with what I have.

So, now.  What's my current quest?  I want to see if I can find the crater in Panamint Valley.

This photo was taken from an airplane in 1947 when it was first discovered!

I have the Lat. and Long. loaded into my computer and my GPS giving me direction.  So, somewhere up ahead....

   

Aw shucks.  I can't do anything without somebody always watching!!  There are three burros in the left photo with Telescope Peak in the background.  I stopped the vehicle, got out and walked towards them whistling and making weird noises hoping to keep their curiosity until I could get close enough for a better picture.  The right photo is as close as I could get.  This is the first time I have ever seen wild burro in this desert.

So, anyway.  Back to my quest.

Here is my topo map and the red dot is where my coordinates say the crater should be.  I drive up the dirt trail that is just to the north of the red dot and got within about .3 miles.  I get out my GPS and walking stick and hike to the location.  Nothing there.  I started walking around the area trying to find it.  C1, C2, C3, C4 and C5 are the waypoints I log in my search.  Nothing.  I go back to the Vanagon and have lunch.  I decided to walk around the red dot at a radius of approximately one quarter of a mile.  That is what all the other numbers, 010 through 033 are as I log waypoints around the red dot hoping to intercept the road the early investigators made..  I also search to the north out to 007.  Nothing.  Hmmm.

I notice I have cell coverage so I call my Brother in Seattle and my friend Eddie in Fort Bragg, CA. and leave messages with them asking them to check the website and see if they can come up with better coordinates.  With in an hour Eddie calls back and gives me new coordinates which indicated the crater should be .95 miles north/northwest of where I am parked.  I marked that location with a Blue dot, (crater2).  Yippee!  I drive back down the road I had arrived on and take an even more obscure trail which is the dotted line across the north west corner of the above map but... I am finally able to drive right to the crater!

This is my attempt to stitch two photos together of the crater.

   

Down in the center of the crater is the old exploration shaft.  Hinged boards covering the shaft in the left photo
and, in the right photo, the ladder down and down and down!

Of course my inquiring mind wants to know how far down, down is.  Here is my research equipment.  One nice rock for weight, some nylon cord, my cordless drill (don't you always carry a cordless drill around with you?) and my tape measure.  I used electrical tape to tape the roll of nylon cord to the chuck on the drill.  Soon I had my answer.

The shaft is 88 feet deep!

I camped overnight by the crater and watched a spectacular sunset on Telescope Peak in the Panamint range.

And a spectacular sunrise in the morning!

I notice the cacti buds are swelling.

I mention this so my friends Ed and Suzanne and my wife Lolli, who are coming to the desert April 17th, will know that there should still be flowers happening.

Meanwhile, while waiting for my friends to arrive I guess I will go into Pahrump, do some grocery shopping, fill my water tank, do my laundry and up-load this latest chapter of my ongoing Solo Trip, and then go find some other quest to pursue.

I am now forty six days into my exploration of Death Valley and the surrounding area.  Having checked out Indian and Meteor activity I am now looking into the more recent past.

Various old mining cabins, in and around the Death Valley area, have been discovered, adopted and fixed up.  I was invited by my friend Jake to visit a cabin he found and has been working on, off and on, for the past four years.  Jeff, Marti, and Old Tom were invited too.  So,

Easter Weekend was spent with my friends at Jake's cabin.

And, of course, there is only one way to observe Easter in a truly religious fashion...,

Hand me that gun Jake!  Yes!  Nothing like a lot of gunfire on Easter morning!!  We set up clay pigeons on yonder rock and took turns shooting at them.  Jeff won the first round, Jake the second and I finally got the hang of it and won the third round with Marti a close second.

I worked off my ammunition bill by helping Jake with the addition to the porch.

And, I must admit, Jake has one fine outhouse.

   

Speaking of religious observance....  Jake and I went for a drive in his Toyota 4Runner, after everyone left, to look at various mines and cabins in the area.  While driving along I spotted these Lilies along the old Tonopah & Tidewater railroad grade!  They are the only Lilies I have seen and I only saw them Easter Sunday!  Is that weird or what!

   

Here is a rather large cabin that is in rough shape.  It would take a lot of fixing but I really liked the view from the outhouse.  The handles attached to the seat are a nice addition!  The toilet paper is under the can held down by a rock.  Basic but effective.

   

Another fixer-upper that is dug mostly into a hillside.  The outhouse has pretty much fallen apart.  Sliver city!

This cabin has had quite a bit or work done to it to bring it back up to usable standards.

   

Inside there was food and water, and a bedroll.  Plus cooking utensils.

A nice wood stove, cot and bed.  Quite civilized.

   

At various remote places there are old trucks that have ended their days and are slowly weathering away.
An International missing its water tank and a home made drilling rig on a Dodge chassis.

There are a lot of mining activity remains at the upper reaches of rough roads.  Here is a ore bucket and a chute made out of cut in half fifty-five gallon drums in the background; a sagging tramway cable overhead.

   

   I'm not much for climbing around in old mines but I do like to take a peek.  The ladder going down the shaft on the left was pretty much rotted away.  This mine was full of old timbers holding up the walls and ceiling.  Quite scary!  I always wonder when the next earthquake will hit.

This is a fine old structure made out of big timbers.  Ore was brought to this structure via a tramway then dumped into trucks via the four chutes.

   

   And here is a kiln!  (Smelter?)  I really thought about my Earthenware friends Doug and Jan and their wood fired kilns when I saw this.  This one melted precious mineral out of crushed rock.  There was a "stoke hole" on the side but I don't know what it was fired with; charcoal maybe.

After five days of being with Jake and his dog Tinker I said my goodbyes and visited one of my favorite cabins, "Bedsprings".
In the above photo you can just see the cabin in the center of the photo.  Even in the surrounding mud hills the wild flower abound!

In my wandering in the hills by Bedsprings I found a wind damaged Desert Five Spot.  It was the biggest Desert Five Spot I have ever seen.  I wrestled it to the ground and hauled it back to the cabin so I could take a photo of it.  Definitely a trophy!  It measured four feet tall and it had 234 flowers and/or buds on it!!

 

Taking a break at Bedsprings.  The weather is perfect, around 47 at night and up to 80 during the day.  I have read two Louis L'Amour westerns that are in the cabin library.  I have done some fixing up around the place and I have put together this installment of my webpage.

P.S.  I want Lolli, Ed and Suzanne to know the cacti are starting to bloom.  Please hurry!
Yes, Ed and Suzanne will be driving out for Spring Break.  My wife Lolli, because of time constraints, will fly to Las Vegas April 17th and I will meet her there.  Then we will all be together for a week of Official, 15th Annual, Spring Break.  Or is it the 14th?

Meanwhile, I guess I will go to Pahrump, Nevada to up-load this and then find something to do!

This week I decided to take a break from vacation and camp at a place I discovered about ten years ago.  It is well off the beaten path.  It has a spring of running water and a cluster of nice shade trees.  A perfect place to kick back, read some books, and observe the local wildlife.

One book I am currently reading is about local Indian rock art and it contains a couple pen and ink copies of some Petroglyphs that really capture the feel and flavor of their subject.

   

A pregnant sheep on the left and talking crows or ravens on the right.  Amazing!

While I read I am distracted by the local birds and I am having a heck of a time with them!  I will be quietly reading my book and notice movement over in the trees.  Sure enough, some bird.  I watch to see if it is going to stay put for a moment or two.  It does.  So I slowly reach for my camera.  Since it is a digital camera I have to wait several seconds for it to turn on.  Then I have to push a lever sideways and hold it there to get to maximum zoom.  And, being an old guy, I have to try and brace myself to keep camera shake to a minimum.  Plus, I have to re-acquire the bird in the viewfinder.  By then the patiently waiting bird has lost patience and moved on!!  I find photographing birds a frustrating business.

Of course I could do like my brother in Redmond, Washington.  Stay home and put out a bird feeder.

Another problem I have is I only have two bird books with me, Audubon's "Deserts", and, "Birds of Northern California", both of which don't list most of what I see.

Well, okay, I know this one for sure.  He is in the "Deserts" book and he is a Gambel's Quail.  Talk about elusive!  I hear them chatting in the bushes all day long but very rarely will one make itself visible.  This was a totally lucky shot and micro-seconds later he was gone..

And this one.  It could be a Nuttall's Woodpecker but it also looks like a Ladder-backed Woodpecker.

A Sage Sparrow?  Kind of big for a sparrow.

   

And this guy?  Can't find him in either book.  He sure is distinctive though.

Ash-throated Flycatcher?

These guys flock together, six or seven in a group.  Wilson's Warbler?  Not likely because the book says the Wilson likes a "cool, moist Riparian habitat, edges of small lakes and springs to 10,000 ft in the northwestern fog belt"!!  This guy is in the desert.

Plus, there are turtle doves and humming birds but no way am I fast enough to catch them with my camera.

There are a few bugs.  They are easier to photograph.

   

The one on the left runs along the ground at almost one mile per hour!  A very busy bug.  The one on the right, according to the Desert book is an Arizona Blister Beetle which "Only lives in Arizona"!!  Right!

And, because of the spring, there are spectacular dragonflies.

But for easy photography, here is a guy that doesn't mind having his photo taken...,

He can barely stay awake while I take his picture!  My "Desert" book indicates he might be a Side-bloched Lizard.
He is prettier than his name.

In the process of observing wildlife it seems some wildlife have moved in to observe me!  Yes, I have acquired a mouse in my Vanagon.  He is only active while I am trying to sleep.  According to my "Desert" book he is a "White Footed" mouse.  He is a pretty golden gray color with a white-ish underside.  Big black eyes, big ears, long whiskers and a tail as long as his body.

I mentioned I had a mouse to my Lolli during our weekly phone conversation.  She gave me some clear instructions.

"He better be gone by the time I get there!"

  "Sorry.  Lolli said."

This is the last week of my Solo Trip.
My wife Lolli and our friends Ed and Suzanne will join me the 17th of April for Spring Break.

So, it is time to get busy and do some of the last minute things I have been thinking about.

First, China Ranch.  I had been told it was worth the hike from there to see the waterfalls of the Amargosa River.

   

They are quite amazing for a desert environment.

Along the way I passed a stone house that was built in 1903.

Another interesting house near the area is Chief Shoshone's home which was carved into this hill.

  

The entry in the right photo!  There are several rooms, windows and even a fireplace.  I suspect it maintains a very comfortable, year round, temperature.

I decided I wanted to watch sunrise from 282 feet below sea level so I got up before daybreak and drove to the Badwater parking area on the floor of Death Valley and hiked out to Lake Manly.

Beautiful.  I took a series of photos as the sun enveloped Telescope Peak and the Panamint Range.

   

I got quite intrigued with the reflections to the right and left of me.

Now, there was only one thing left to do.  Get high!

I drove north through Stove Pipe Wells and up Wildrose Canyon to the charcoal kilns which are at an elevation of 6,800 feet..

Then hiked the Wildrose Peak trail to the crest of the Panamint mountains at 8,200 feet.

I was able to look back down to where I had been early in the morning only now I am standing in snow!!
Pretty darn good.  I had turned 64 the day before and was feeling my oats!  Along the way I met a man from Belgium who told me he is 71!

Well, anyway, Happy Birthday to us!

But now, my sixty days in the wilderness has come to an end.

   

I am camped on the outskirts of Las Vegas.  Waiting for vacation to begin!!