Death Valley Offroad Trip

For my first multi-day offroad trip, I hooked up with Badlands 4x4 for a 4 day trip through Death Valley National Park.

Day 0

Since the trip started early in Beatty, NV, I left a day early to stay overnight in Beatty.  The trip up was nice and uneventful.  I stopped for a quick hike at Salt River then made it to Beatty.  The first thing I noticed were all the feral burros.  I camped at a RV park and had dinner at a local BBQ place.  Beatty is a nice little town.

 

Camping at RV park

Beatty burro

Day 1

The 10 cars all rendezvoused at a local gas station for a briefing.  Due to the recent storms, many of the major roads through the park were closed so we had to work around those.

First stop was Chloride City.  We had our first taste of 4L going over some fairly easy obstacles.  At the old mining districts were several building and lots of adits.

Leaving Chloride City, we had to drive all the way down to Death Valley Junction and into the park.  We stopped at Furnace Creek for permits and lunch.  It was a balmy 90 degrees!  Next stop was Stovepipe Wells for gas.  From there we drove through Emigrant Canyon and out to Augenberry Point.  The views from here are some of the best I have seen.  We ended up at Wildrose to camp for the night.

Driver meeting

Chloride City mine

Chloride City

Lots of closed roads in DVNP

View from Aguireberry Point

View from Aguireberry Point

Camp at Wildrose

Day 2

After a good night's sleep, we headed out on Wildrose Rd out into Panamint Valley.  We drove south for a while mainly on the west side of the valley.  We then turned into Goler Wash and an awesome ride to Barker Ranch.  We had lunch at the ranch which was the last hideout of the Manson family.  After eating, we headed over Mengle Pass.  The pass had a few tough obstacles but we all made it through ok.  Next stop was Geologist's Cabin in Butte Valley.  The cabin was quite nice.  After a short visit, we headed back the way we came.  Back in Panamint Valley, the wind really picked up.  To get out of the wind, we headed back to Wildrose to camp for the night.

Driving in Panamint Valley

Barker Ranch

Another Manson victim?

Butte Valley

Inside Geologist Cabin

Making dinner

Second camp at Wildrose - note the rock holddowns

Day 3

The night wasn't too windy but the tent did great anyway.  Heading back into Panamint Valley, we turned north and stopped at Panamint Springs for gas, snacks and other stuff.  We then headed west on 190 and then north on Saline Valley Road. It was a nice climb into Hunter Mt. area.  We stopped briefly at Hunter Cabin and then drove out to Lost Burro Mine.  The mine still had lots of structures and was a nice place to visit.  After lunch at the mine, we headed back to Saline Valley Road and headed down Grapevine Canyon into Saline Valley.  The road was very bumpy and rocky until we got to the bottom.  From there we headed to Warm Springs for camp.  The wind picked up again, but it wasn't too bad.  We had a nice dinner near our vehicles.  I think only a couple of group tried the springs.

Start to Saline Valley Road

Looking down into Panamint Valley

Hunter Cabin

Lost Burro Mine

Inside cabin at Lost Burro

Junction marker sculpture at Warm Springs

Coyote at Warm Springs

Camp at Warm Springs

Day 4

The next day, we headed north on Saline Valley Road over North Pass and turned east towards Big Pine.  After airing up, I left the group and headed home.

The trip was super awesome!  The Jeep did great as did all my gear.  The only big change I will need to make is to install a hard-wired GMRS radio since my HT's kept running out of battery.

Getting gas with Mt. Whitney in the background