From Hoover Dam to Death Valley to a Well Deserved Beer at Jakes Saloon in Lone Pine, Calif

As we pulled out of the parking deck at the Hoover Dam after our visit, we discussed briefly the idea of driving over the dam on the two lane road that crosses the top of the dam. One quick look at the traffic backed up creeping slowly across the dam made our decision easy and also glad that we had arrived at 9:00 a.m. and finished before noon. 

We had a lot more to see--next destination was Death Valley, the largest national park in our country.  First, we stopped in nearby Boulder City to stock up on groceries and ice for our huge Coleman cooler.  We weren't sure where we would sleep that night--we figured we would ask a ranger after we left Death Valley for tips on campgrounds.   We headed off to the blazing hot desert of Nevada and California. I may mention the heat several times in this post because I have never really experienced anything like the heat blast in Death Valley. 

Entering Death Valley seemed relatively uneventful.   Just follow the signs. You know something is different though because the drive is a slow decent into this absolutely inhospitable place. I can't imagine a pioneer making a wrong turn and finding themselves faced with this huge expanse of nothing but rock, sand and yes, heat. As the driver and the one responsible for the family trickster running smoothly, I begin to question why we are driving into a hot, dry place with nothing but sand, rock and heat. But the Old Chevy hummed along and the air conditioning blasted away. I did wonder though if the pioneers that did find themselves faced with this route thought the same thing, "Oh the horses are fine and I'm sure there will be water over the next hill."

Right before we entered the official Death Valley we came to a T in the road and a sign that said Death Valley Junction.  Junction of what?-- heat and sand and rock?  But actually there was something out here.  A hotel. A really old hotel and an opera house.  Well, that's what was painted in faded blue on the side of the building. The Amargosa Opera House and Hotel.  Wow, a real live ghost town in the middle of the desert, only it wasn't a ghost town, but an actual working hotel and opera house.  Apparently no one told the ghost that they weren't needed yet.  More on that in a moment.

Sand, rocks, heat, faded paint, old broken gas pumps, and a small neon sign that said open.  I began to see flashes of the dumb horror movies and the dumber teenagers that go into the old abandoned house with the sharp farm instrument hanging on the wall and the scary music all warning them not to go in and yet they do. And of course it never works out for the best.

Well here we are, with my loved ones on a family vacation and we are in a place called DEATH VALLEY and there we are about to open the door to what appears to be an abandoned hotel with only a small open sign flickering in the window. We open the door and instead of some creepy old hotel owner we meet Rich, a very friendly hotel manager and local historian and willing to allow this tourist family to poke around this establishment and ask all sorts of questions.

The hotel was used in 1923 when the borax mining in Death Valley was big and the investors would come into town and needed a place to stay. It also housed some of the miners and attached to the property were other buildings that serviced the miners like a small store, hospital and such.  The opera house was also there to entertain the investors.  Rich told us that the author Zane Grey shamed the investors into providing the funds for this establishment.  

Back in 1967 a New York stage actress named Marta Beckett and her husband found themselves at this junction with a flat tire and stopped.  She peered into the abandoned opera house and found her destiny and stayed.  She did not own the opera house at that time but lived there and spent years painting murals and even painted an audience on the walls of the opera house.  She performed every weekend whether anyone real was in the audience or not and soon the word spread and she did indeed save some local history and she did end up buying the property.  She is still there, and performs n a wheelchair as of just this year and she is 85 years old.  In fact, she was in the next room with some friends when we were talking with Rich.

The hotel is still operating and I was not quite sure who would drive way out here to stay in a old hotel.  Rich said that a lot of Europeans visit and know of Ms. Beckett.  When I mean old, I mean everything was old. The beds, the curtains, the sinks, the carpets, the paint.  Not much has been done to ruin that authentic  feel.  Even the stains on the ceiling looked old. But there was something intriguing about the place. I could see people staying on a dare or some looking to say they stayed a night in Death Valley Junction and lived to tell about it. According to Rich, a lot of people do stay at the hotel--Europeans and Asians mainly, but it did not appear as if anyone was there at the time. 

Remember when I said some forgot to tell the ghost they weren't needed yet. That is because according to Rich the Hotel is haunted and all sorts of strange things happen when guests stay the night. In fact the hotel was featured on the TV show Ghost Hunters. And you know those guys are serious about their ghosts. (The episode can be viewed in parts on YouTube).

We walked down the long corridor and poked around the rooms and even used the bathroom before we left. I mention the bathroom because I asked Rich where they get their water from and he mentioned that the water table was just a few feet below the surface and he gets the softest, and freshest water straight out of the ground beneath the hotel. The soft water was detail not gone unnoticed by our OCD oldest child who needs to be clean all the time (as we learned during this trip).  He kept scrubbing his hands because he thought the smooth feeling on his hands was soap that wouldn't come off. Rich explained it was the extra soft water out of the ground that caused that sensation.  Of course my less than OCD middle child didn't notice anything after he used the restroom because he never washed his hands.

We said our goodbyes and continued deeper into Death Valley, which consists of miles of roads in all directions.  Michele had the guide books and had done her research and knew which sites were which way.  It is true when they say you need more than just an afternoon or a day to see everything.  We stopped at  vista and read about the borax that was mined out of there.  Does Twenty Mule Team sound familiar. It's the name of a cleaner that has been around for a long time and this is where it all started and the mules did cart it away.

(Zabriskies Point.  Click any photo to enlarge)

It  was getting late and we had not yet gotten to the lowest point in the continental US.:  Badwater Basin. We continued to drive through the sand, rocks and heat.  I was now really feeling like the old pioneers, "We've come too far to turn back now!" One more turn down a lonely two lane desert road and we came to the lowest point in the US. It was kind of interesting to see that some one had marked high up on a cliff the mark at which see level would be measured and we were standing 282 feet below sea level.

Yes, cliff, because Death Valley consists of mountains and cliffs as well as sand.  The sun was incredible. We parked the Suburban and walked out into the salt flats. We know it was salt because my wife and youngest son decided to pick up some particles and taste it. I told you it was hot out there. We walked about one hundred yards and got the idea. We could have walked for another 10 days and it would still be the same.

The boys took off their shirts for the walk back to the Suburban.  Oh, and we weren't the only ones taking this walk.  We did pass others at each stop we made in Death Valley.  And everyone was from Europe.  Death Valley is a huge attraction outside of the USA.

One of the other highlights in the Valley was called the Mesquite Sand Dunes.  The sun was setting by this time and we looked at dunes that could have been in the Sahara.  After this we were headed to Highway 395 to the town of Lone Pine.  But it took another hour at least just to get out of Death Valley and over a 4,000 foot mountain with many switchbacks.

 We were long past the point of being able to find a visitor center or ranger station open so Michele called Choice Hotels to find us a room for the night--that is after she could get phone service.   Once the reservation was set up for the Comfort Inn in Lone Pine, CA, we arrived at Highway 395, turned right, and there was the Comfort Inn.  From that point on we never had a warm night camping, which worked out well--who wants to camp in a tent of five people if it is really warm?

After we checked into our hotel it was by now 8:00 p.m. and we drove down the road of this western town where literally the old westerns used to be filmed, and ate at a Mexican restaurant that had excellent food and the waiter suggested what town we should camp in the next night which turned out to be excellent advice.

  

After dinner we drove the boys back to the hotel and they chilled out with TV and wifi for Keegan's IPod and Michele and I drove back down the road again to Jake's Saloon (swinging doors and all) for a beer.  That was one long day.  Oh, and did I mention that across the street from our hotel was Mt. Whitney?  Amazing that within a few hours we saw the lowest elevation and then we saw the mountain that has the highest elevation in the lower 48.