When a weekend like President's Day comes up for us 9 to 5 ers, we have to take advantage and get out of town for a quick road trip. Death Valley is not exactly the "quick road trip" category, and isn't exactly in our back yard, but hey, at least we were taking advantage.




With a cross country Volvo packed to the gills with camping gear, and minds full of anticipation, we made our way out of Babylon (read as: anywhere near Los Angeles or other large metropolitan areas). The approach would take us through one of the most spectacular highways in the US, the 395 which runs up the Owens Valley. We tried to ignore the fact that the beautiful Eastern Sierras are even to this day being drained by greedy developers. Yes, this infamous valley has pipes running all the way south in order for the Babylon whence we came to exist. But we rode through that incredibly majestic valley taking in the vistas with awe just the same.

After a long ride through the desert, we made our way down Highway 190, the western entrance to the National Park known as Death Valley. Unlike Donner Pass, which had so many casualties that there should be a huge memorial there, this auspiciously named park got its name with only one member of the caravan meeting an untimely demise.




At Father Crowley lookout we were treated to an amazing vista, and from there spied what seemed like the aforementioned park. It contained an alluvial plain and flat valley, complete with sand dunes at the northern end underneath a circle of high mountain peaks - so much like descriptions we had heard about the place - that we believed we were witnessing the last few hours of daylight on a national treasure.

The short roundabout dirt road that led to our crow's nest was merely a mile long at most. Little did we know this would just be the tip of the iceberg, or more appropriately, the grain of sand in the sand dune, when it came to utilizing the off-road capabilities of his low-clearance Volvo. More on that later.

ER Harris