An Evergreen Life: South and West Part 1

Parowan Gap

A trip in February took us to Death Valley. We had never been there and the temperatures in winter would be moderate so we decided to check it out. We left Colorado on a Sunday morning in a snow storm. Not the best timing as anyone who has had to sit I70 in ski traffic knows. It took us a bit longer to get out of Colorado than we planned and we postponed some of our exploring in Utah for the return trip. We did stop at Fremont State Park in UT where the Fremont people had lived 1000 years ago. When I70 was being constructed the evidence of a large settlement was found and excavated. There are numerous rock art panels, trails and a small museum. Unfortunately they had so much moisture that the trails were slippery and very soggy. We will have to go back another day when the hiking is better.

After a night in Richfield, UT we picked up I15 south and made a detour to Parowan Gap. This is a fascinating site with lots of unusual rock art. Parowan is a wind gap, marking where an ancient river cut a 600 ft. deep notch through the hills.

Parowan Gap
There are many glyphs covering the rocks. A native american described one of the images as a "map and calendar of travels". There is a lot more at this site than I can explain but a good summary can be found here:

http://www.parowan.org/index.php/heritage/parowangap.html.

"Zipper" glyph possibly a map representing the cairns

We arrived at Death Valley and our Furnace Creek campsite after dark. Nice campground although like other national parks fairly high density. We did have two trees in our site. Next day we hiked Mosaic Canyon, a short slot canyon that ends at a 30 ft pour over.

Lots of small pour overs to scramble over before you reach the end.

End of the trail

Beginning of Mosaic Canyon

Death Valley reminded me of a smaller San Luis Valley but instead of mountains surrounding it there were mud like hills. There are some high peaks, Telescope Mt. is the highest at 11,331 ft. and the more well known lowest spots Badwater Basin at 282 ft. below sea level. Temperatures can be brutal but we had very comfortable 40's at night and 70's during the days. The geology is incredible, there are many unusual and varied landscapes in the park.

Devil's Corn Field

Badwater Basin

Ubhebe Crater

Gas in the park was so expensive we drove to the nearby town of Beatty NV. On the way back into the park we stopped at the ghost town of Rhyolite. The town was established in 1905 as a mining claim. By 1907 the town had grown to about 5,000 people and had electric lights , telephones, a school, hospital, ice cream parlor and opera house. But shortly after the mine began to fail and by 1911 Rhyolite was almost deserted. In the 1920's the town was used as a movie set and there was some tourism. In 1924 the last resident passed away. Many of the buildings and materials were carried off to Beatty. One structure that survived is the bottle house, constructed with 50,000 bottles!