Death Valley with friends
Furnace Creek Campground
We stayed the same place as last year Getting sites was made easy via recreation.gov, the site makes it easy to setup dates for your visit and get notified when the sites open up. We started looking for January dates around November. Planning is not my forte, however it is Donna’s. Our travel destinations are not always planned months in advance, often we just determine a place to be. This trip was different, we had friends joining us in Death Valley. Our travel companions just purchased a new Class C. The trip to Death Valley would be their first visit to the park and the first multi day trip in the new camper. To say the least Donna and I were excited to share one of our favorite places with them.
The Travel
Donna and I left Santa Monica at 2300 on Wednesday evening. Our neighborhood has been highly impacted by fire, although we were looking forward to cleaner air we were trepidatious to leave LA. The worry about our community, the feeling that we were leaving an empty house that could be used, and fears for our neighbors and friends all were major concerns. The last time we packed up and left Santa Monica was in August. Packing and getting rolling has us both second guessing if we were doing everything correctly. Spolier: We forgot two things: Hard white cheese and Donna’s monitor cable.
Rosamond was our first stop, we traveled up the 405 through the newly developing Sepulvada fire. The National Guard was arriving on scene to provide traffic control and direction. As we rolled through, the fire must have just started as no resources were on site and people on the freeway were all pulling over to watch the fire run up the hill. We made it through safely after dodging distracted road users.
We enjoy utilizing our Harvest Host membership, we stopped for the night at Guido’s Old Tyme Pizza. We arrived at Guido’s at 0100, I was excited to grab some sleep, I am not sure I would have been able to put in another twenty minutes of driving.
After grabbing a few hours of sleep, I was ready to hit the road, we got rolling after conference calls and walking the dogs, leaving Rosamond at ~1130. After three and half hours and 172 miles we pulled into Furnace Creek campground at 1630.
Getting setup for our week+ in Furnace Creek we quickly noticed Donna was missing her monitor cable. Our travel companions were going to leave Mar Vista on Satuday. Amazon was able to get a new cable delivered within a few hours, allowing us to have all the necessary things to work by Monday morning.
The campground
We like the campground, it’s well managed and in the middle of the most popular park features. Although Donna had a full work schedule, I was able to get away and see many features. I was acting as a pseudo tour guide.
Cycling
I have fallen back in love with cycling. The last few years I got away from riding the bike for many reasons. I am finally back in a place where I know I can ride as hard as I want and enjoy it. I have been spending > 13 hours a week on the bike, I decided I would upgrade my main road bike. Sundays Cycles did the build for me.
I joined the board of my local cycling group La Grange, the group is a non-profit 501c3. I like to ride bikes with everybody and I look forward to helping the club grow and support cycling in the community.
Features
We did a Jeep tour which took us up to see Inyo mine and the 20 Mule Canyon. I was flabbergasted by the 20 mule canyon. Although when I think about Death Valley I think about the vibrancy and brilliance of the ecology and geology. I think the nomenclature for the valley is antiphrasis.
Last year we visited during a full moon, this year a new moon. The dark sky programs in both scenarios are awesome. We attended three different ranger talks all focused on how to enjoy stargazing. The full moon programs had scheduled hikes in the moonlight canyons/basins.
New Modification List
- Add Red LEDs to the Entry/Exit door on Olive
- Find a way to install RED or multi color LEDs on the bottom Olive
- Replace seat cushion foam
Location
Minny and Doowee
Minny and Doowee enjoyed the travel, They got walks and meet a few kind people. Many treats were had!
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Death Valley 2025
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