# Death Valley



## pismoe

Anyone been there .    I've been there many times , I went on July 4th one year to experience the weather .  It was 128 degrees at about 7 in the evening and the ravens were sitting in the shadows of the date palms on the resorts property .   They were just sitting in the shadows with their beaks wide open .   I saw a few guys running in that heat , they were all dressed in white and were running to build up endurance and in preparation for some race .   Outside the resort where we stayed [one time] there is the small [500 people] town  of BEATTY Nevada where we stayed in motels on later trips.   Expensive at the resort and cheaper at Beatty's motels plus there are a few affordable restaurants and a few stores for beer and pretzels , spam , cheese plus there are a few bars /  saloons in Beatty .   Outside of Beatty there is area 51 , a few brothels , some semi ghost towns like Goldhill , Tonapah and a few other tiny towns .   Some of these ghost towns are home to hotels that are reopening and are doing business .


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## Moonglow

I haven't driven through there since 1978...not much there then...


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## hjmick

I've been there a time or two, off roading and such. Back when you could do that sort of thing out there... Checked out the sailing stones of Racetrack Playa, the borax mines and such... Scotty's Castle... 


The desert is a beautiful, clean place...


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## westwall

Been there many, many times.  I even helped on a paleo dig in the Amargosa Chaos back in 1979.  Tecopa Hot Springs is an old favorite haunt of mine.  Chinese Ranch is nice too.


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## pismoe

MIZPAH Hotel ---  About Mizpah Hotel - Mizpah Hotel - Tonopah - United States  --- in Tonapah Nevada .    I saw it before it reopened , nice to see it back in business .


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## pismoe

yeah , I really like it although now I think there are entry fees .    Anyone ever been to DARWIN ??


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## pismoe

DARWIN Cali .   , KEELER is also nearby and is a little  bit interesting as it has a roadside pioneer graveyard and a silver mine up on the mountain .   The grave yard is tiny and has / had a wrought iron fence around it used to have a lake and had shipping and a dock near OLANCHA .  Water from the lake was diverted to Los Angeles I think .    ---  Darwin - California Ghost Town  ---


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## pismoe

DARWIN movie trailer plus some pictures and links ---   Darwin Documentary  ---


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## pismoe

Amargosa chaos . Pretty interesting , you may be a Geologist ehh Westwall ??   ---  Amargosa Chaos - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia  ---   I've been to the Amargosa Opera house , saw the peacock and checked out the graveyard in the area .    Never went inside the opera house  though .


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## pismoe

Amargosa Opera House ---   Amargosa Opera House  ---


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## westwall

pismoe said:


> DARWIN Cali .   , KEELER is also nearby and is a little  bit interesting as it has a roadside pioneer graveyard and a silver mine up on the mountain .   The grave yard is tiny and has / had a wrought iron fence around it used to have a lake and had shipping and a dock near OLANCHA .  Water from the lake was diverted to Los Angeles I think .    ---  Darwin - California Ghost Town  ---







Many times.  Go to the Darwin Dump and you can find argentiferous galena samples to take home!


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## westwall

pismoe said:


> Amargosa chaos . Pretty interesting , you may be a Geologist ehh Westwall ??   ---  Amargosa Chaos - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia  ---   I've been to the Amargosa Opera house , saw the peacock and checked out the graveyard in the area .    Never went inside the opera house  though .








Yup....very definitely a geologist


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## Goddess_Ashtara

Death Valley is so beautiful.


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## pismoe

i'm not in the area anymore Westwall , now i'm checking out the areas in the PNW and last trip was to the Oregon Outback , high desert and out by John Day .   I'm surprised by the way that I really liked the California desert as I grew up in the land of water , trees and snow .


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## AquaAthena

pismoe said:


> Anyone been there .    I've been there many times , I went on July 4th one year to experience the weather .  It was 128 degrees at about 7 in the evening and the ravens were sitting in the shadows of the date palms on the resorts property .   They were just sitting in the shadows with their beaks wide open .   I saw a few guys running in that heat , they were all dressed in white and were running to build up endurance and in preparation for some race .   Outside the resort where we stayed [one time] there is the small [500 people] town  of BEATTY Nevada where we stayed in motels on later trips.   Expensive at the resort and cheaper at Beatty's motels plus there are a few affordable restaurants and a few stores for beer and pretzels , spam , cheese plus there are a few bars /  saloons in Beatty .   Outside of Beatty there is area 51 , a few brothels , some semi ghost towns like Goldhill , Tonapah and a few other tiny towns .   Some of these ghost towns are home to hotels that are reopening and are doing business .



Yes, been there at least 3 times. What a surreal experience. We always went in May, when the temps were tolerable. We stayed at the resort. The beautiful spring flowers were everywhere, going down into Death Valley. We also hiked to the highest hill and looked down upon the magnificent valley. 

We knew that Charles Manson and his flock had once lived in those hills.


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## pismoe

it is pretty neat , I imagine the 49ers getting lost and stranded and burning their wagons and slaughtering their oxen when they got lost in DV in 1849 .   I imagine the miners in the mines working in the heat and cold and primitive conditions and working for pennies a day and eating beans , beans and more beans .    We went for the heat , just to see what it was like as I know 50 below and I wanted to see HOT weather.  Also interesting is the falling down town of Trona which is on the other side of DV .  Trona is a mining town with a company railroad for hauling  mine supplies I think .   It has a school , a  high school football team and a store or 2 or three .   Anyway , outside Trona and heading into the desert is BALLARAT .   Ballarat was a mining camp , then a ghost town and is now a very primitive campground that has a tiny ill stocked store and a caretaker .    Anyway the campground has the Manson truck [claimed] .  Also , Ballarat was home to an old desert rat called Seldom Seen Slim .   The Manson clan supposedly lived at the Spahn ranch whish is also in the area of Ballarat but up in the brush a few miles I think .  ---   Seldom Seen Slim aka Charles Ferge and his Life at Ballarat - DesertUSA  ---   As far as the view , I like the view as you enter DV from the Olancha end of DV . Its called BREZISKI POINT  .


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## westwall

AquaAthena said:


> pismoe said:
> 
> 
> 
> Anyone been there .    I've been there many times , I went on July 4th one year to experience the weather .  It was 128 degrees at about 7 in the evening and the ravens were sitting in the shadows of the date palms on the resorts property .   They were just sitting in the shadows with their beaks wide open .   I saw a few guys running in that heat , they were all dressed in white and were running to build up endurance and in preparation for some race .   Outside the resort where we stayed [one time] there is the small [500 people] town  of BEATTY Nevada where we stayed in motels on later trips.   Expensive at the resort and cheaper at Beatty's motels plus there are a few affordable restaurants and a few stores for beer and pretzels , spam , cheese plus there are a few bars /  saloons in Beatty .   Outside of Beatty there is area 51 , a few brothels , some semi ghost towns like Goldhill , Tonapah and a few other tiny towns .   Some of these ghost towns are home to hotels that are reopening and are doing business .
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Yes, been there at least 3 times. What a surreal experience. We always went in May, when the temps were tolerable. We stayed at the resort. The beautiful spring flowers were everywhere, going down into Death Valley. We also hiked to the highest hill and looked down upon the magnificent valley.
> 
> We knew that Charles Manson and his flock had once lived in those hills.
Click to expand...








The tallest is Telescope Peak which is a climb.  Manson and Co. were over at the old Barker ranch.  Another weird place is Ballarat.  My favorite though was Trona.  When I was there it was still a company town.  The concertina wire was turned IN on the Sheriffs substation...


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## westwall

pismoe said:


> it is pretty neat , I imagine the 49ers getting lost and stranded and burning their wagons and slaughtering their oxen when they got lost in DV in 1849 .   I imagine the miners in the mines working in the heat and cold and primitive conditions and working for pennies a day and eating beans , beans and more beans .    We went for the heat , just to see what it was like as I know 50 below and I wanted to see HOT weather.  Also interesting is the falling down town of Trona which is on the other side of DV .  Trona is a mining town with a company railroad for hauling  mine supplies I think .   It has a school , a  high school football team and a store or 2 or three .   Anyway , outside Trona and heading into the desert is BALLARAT .   Ballarat was a mining camp , then a ghost town and is now a very primitive campground that has a tiny ill stocked store and a caretaker .    Anyway the campground has the Manson truck [claimed] .  Also , Ballarat was home to an old desert rat called Seldom Seen Slim .   The Manson clan supposedly lived at the Spahn ranch whish is also in the area of Ballarat but up in the brush a few miles I think .  ---   Seldom Seen Slim aka Charles Ferge and his Life at Ballarat - DesertUSA  ---   As far as the view , I like the view as you enter DV from the Olancha end of DV . Its called BREZISKI POINT  .







Trona is home to Searles Valley Minerals which processes the lake brine to make carbonate and sulfate minerals for agriculture and industry.  Originally it was owned by Kerr-McGee.


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## pismoe

I like TRONA , probably mostly because its isolated and in the desert . Never really spent much time there but its something to see .   Interesting because there are lots of burned out homes but also some very nice homes .   Never made it to the Pinnacles though and i'm sorry about that .  --- also , for a while there , maybe 6 years ago there was the BALLARAT Bandit running around .


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## pismoe

BARKER ranch , yep , that's right .   Here is a small account on the Ballarat Bandit .   ---  The Bandit of Ballarat | Jack Elliott's Santa Barbara Adventure  ---


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## Spoonman

AquaAthena said:


> pismoe said:
> 
> 
> 
> Anyone been there .    I've been there many times , I went on July 4th one year to experience the weather .  It was 128 degrees at about 7 in the evening and the ravens were sitting in the shadows of the date palms on the resorts property .   They were just sitting in the shadows with their beaks wide open .   I saw a few guys running in that heat , they were all dressed in white and were running to build up endurance and in preparation for some race .   Outside the resort where we stayed [one time] there is the small [500 people] town  of BEATTY Nevada where we stayed in motels on later trips.   Expensive at the resort and cheaper at Beatty's motels plus there are a few affordable restaurants and a few stores for beer and pretzels , spam , cheese plus there are a few bars /  saloons in Beatty .   Outside of Beatty there is area 51 , a few brothels , some semi ghost towns like Goldhill , Tonapah and a few other tiny towns .   Some of these ghost towns are home to hotels that are reopening and are doing business .
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Yes, been there at least 3 times. What a surreal experience. We always went in May, when the temps were tolerable. We stayed at the resort. The beautiful spring flowers were everywhere, going down into Death Valley. We also hiked to the highest hill and looked down upon the magnificent valley.
> 
> We knew that Charles Manson and his flock had once lived in those hills.
Click to expand...


I love the desert.  especial after it gets a rain.   I have a piece of petrified wood that came off the Spahn Ranch property where Charles manson and his group lived for awhile


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## pismoe

MANSONS getaway truck at Ballarat ---  Charles Manson's Forgotten Getaway Truck  ---


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## pismoe

DEATH VALLEY related news , mystery solved .   ---  Mystery of California s Wandering Stones solved - Telegraph  ---   I figured that it was simple like this , I thought vibration but this is interesting .


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