2012
From a distance, the salt flats at Badwater Basin in Death Valley look quite, well, flat. Indeed, if you visit Badwater and walk out onto the salt, the initial stretch where everyone walks is indeed flat. But off the beaten path, the flats are quite rough. The salt flats are made up of masses of polygonal structures of varying size. These are formed by expansion of the salt mud as the water evaporates and the salt crystals grow. The park […]
This photo was taken where the West Side Roadcrosses the salt creek that flows (when it rains) from north to south along the valley. The salt here is 95% NaCl (sodium chloride, or table salt) and forms a crust three to five feet thick. Whenever it rains, some of the white salt dissolves. As the water in the valley then evaporates the level of the water drops towards the lowest points in the valley which is why this view ends […]
A little further north on the West Side Road, I captured this view east across Badwater Basin of an alluvial fan at the base of a washout in the Amargosa Range that runs down the eastern side of Death Valley. This shot was taken with my Canon 75-300mm f/4.0-5.6 III USM (B&H) lens racked out to 300mm. As a consequence, the distance across the valley has been considerably compressed. In the foreground is some scrubby vegetation. The orange layers in […]
This view of Death Valley was taken from near the intersection of the West Side Road and the track that leads up into Johnson Canyon. The rain was still falling but most of it seemed to be evaporating before getting to the ground. The zone of bright green bushes was in a slight depression that clearly captured more of the scant rainfall than the gravelly area immediately in front of me. Again, the light was a curious mix as, to […]
So if you saw yesterday’s photo looking south along West Side Road, this one was taken five minutes earlier, but looking north rather than south. You can see that I’m standing in bright sunlight yet less than a mile away a band of rain is sweeping across the Panamint Range and more specifically, Galena Canyon. Death Valley records 2.36 inches (60mm) of rain annually. Curiously this rain just hovered over the hills. I had a few drops fall on my […]
So the only previous time I’d been to Death Valley, I stayed to the blacktop. But this time, this time I thought I’d try the dirt road capabilities of my rented Infiniti G35 Coupe. A few miles north of Ashford Millon Route 178 you can turn left onto the West Side Road. Aptly named, this 40-mile dirt road takes you to the west of Badwater Basin. This view is looking south, in the direction from which I have come. The […]