Death Valley Deep Dive 2024

[Beardilocks]

I'll start out by admitting that this trip was heavily under-documented.  But the most epic trips can be the hardest to capture. 

I had been waiting to thread this adventure in in between weather systems and other issues that complicate dirtbag-life.  We had had a nice warm week or two in Death Valley National Park without any precipitation that melted off a bit of the snow cover at higher elevations, but there was another storm looming on the horizon (what would become the Sierra Nevada Blizzard of 2024, dumping over 10ft of snow and 190mph recored wind gusts in the mountains).  So we headed out to see if we could squeeze this adventure in between.. 

And that was a big question:  Could we make it?  The start of our route, on the north end of Saline Valley Rd, was a known (if very washboarded) quantity.  That road was heavily travelled down to the Warm Springs this time of year no matter what the conditions (even if the Navy has to chopper out stuck drivers occasionally).  Past that we had to head down the rough old mining road in Marble Canyon (reports from 2-3mo ago said it was passable before Feb 4-7 atmospheric river that hit the park) before turning off into Jackass Canyon and on to Jackass Flats, for which the most recent road report I could dig up was about 3 years old (or about 4 floods ago haha).  THEN there was one more pass down to the dry lake where the hike would hopefully start. 

But first was a 200 mile drive across DV and over Towne Pass, up 190/136 to Lone Pine, onto 395 up to Big Pine, and finally into the Northern most part of DVNP. 

I arrived after sundown deep in Marble Canyon on Saline Valley Rd and crashed at an old mine camp for the night.  I met up with Brice the next morning to see how far in we could make it. 

Marble Canyon Rd was rough and heavily rearranged from the floods of the past few years, but was showing tracks of recent visitation and was passable, if a bit interesting in spots.  The turn off into Jackass Canyon showed no sign that anyone had attempted it since Hurricane Hilary hit last summer.  Jackass Canyon is a tight, rough and rocky, if short, gatekeeper to all that is beyond.  I would say that it's folly to attempt it anything short of a modified high clearance 4wd.  A smaller, lighter stock HC 4wd might make it ok.  But leave the Subaru at home.  The biggest hurdle is a gigantic boulder that has fallen into the canyon, giving you barely 6ft between it and a solid rock wall.  With spotting and careful driving (and a couple of attempts) we got my 80-series and Brice's 5th Gen 4Runner through, but only with an inch or two to spare.  The rest of the canyon is very rough. 

And I was so focused on getting through that I took no pictures.  I warned you this trip was woefully documented…  I did film it on the way out, so see the video below for footage going through the canyon.  All I have from the way in is a couple of crappy screen caps from a dash cam video.



Boulder is 3.5-4ft tall. 


And here's a couple of pics of the top of the canyon from the way back out. 




After squeezing through Jackass Canyon, the road winds it's way over several small hills before it crests a small ridge out onto Jackass Flats.  And boy is it gorgeous. 





On the ~6.5 mile drive across the beautiful Jackass Flats it was apparent that virtually no one has been out here in decades, the road overgrown in sections by pin-stripe-happy bushes and undercarriage-scrubbing brush. We reached the end of the road at a Wilderness Boundary to take a warm up/sidequest hike to Crest Benchmark.  What we had been hoping would be a 3mi hike became a 7mi hike because the road ended earlier than expected.  It's still a nice wash hike followed by gorgeous views of Eureka Peak (the target for the next day) on one side and the snowy Inyo Mountains on the other side with bonus views of the Saline Valley dunes. 

Odd mining trash on the way in.  Some sort of sifting screen I would imagine.


We weren't sure which finger of the ridge was Crest BM so we hit every one of them for good measure.  Haha. 








Every once in a while we'd hit an area carpeted in obsidian flakes, where ancient people had stopped to rest or camp and chip down the obsidian chunks they'd quarried somewhere.  I have seen similar spots in Saline Valley, Eureka Valley, and a few other spots in the Northern end of the park with heavy obsidian lithic scatter, which is fairly rare in the area in general.  Someday I'll have to track down the source...


We returned to the vehicles and headed back up Jackass Flats to the last unknown road before we got to the jumping off point for our hike the next day, a road Gaia calls De Coster Cabin Rd.  Google turns up nothing on the name De Coster and there are no mines or prospects shown on the USGS in this whole hidden valley or the surrounding hills.  The road was washed out in several places and a bit flexy in spots, but passable for us.

But there is definitely a cabin. 


It took me way way too long to get Hotel Hanta.  As in Hantavirus. 


I would later find the tailgate for what I believe is the same vehicle several miles away. 











And with that we camped on the edge of the dry lake (more of a tumbleweed lake really) for the night and turned in early to get an early start on Eureka Peak in the morning. 


We were off across the dry lake, cursing the thorny tumbleweeds, not long after the sun came over the ridgeline.  The view as we crossed over the saddle into the drainage of the next drylake was absolutely stunning. 


Dropping the 1000ft over about 3.5mi down to the next drylake, we found another sea of tumbleweeds. This area has a very unique geology and is dotted with these small small dry lake beds separated by smallish ridges.  Some drained into Eureka Valley and some drained into Saline Valley. 


I made it over this ridge, another drylake, another ridge, and onto the slopes of Eureka Peak only to have to throw in the towel about 2mi from my goal of the summit.  A lingering knee injury that's been haunting me all winter forced me to make the tough call to bail on the last steep climb to the summit in the interest of making the 6.5mi hike back out in one piece.  Next time Eureka Peak, next time. 

I wandered over the beautiful terrain while Brice made the summit and met up with me eventually on the way back up the long drainage between dry lakes. 

But it was the most beautiful scenery one could hope to be limping through.


Attack of the Tumbleweeds.  Between these (and another thorny bush that I managed to trip over my own hiking pole and fall into) I had to do some serious plier/tweezer work to do on my lower legs when I got back to my truck...


We made it back to the trucks with about 40min of daylight left.  On the whole it was about 13 miles of hiking and 2500ft of gain for me, a bit more for those that made it to the peak.  I settled in for some rest and a big meal before we headed out (hopefully) ahead of the storm the next day. 


And here is the abridged version of the drive out.  About 1.5hrs compressed down to about 6min.  When I get some wifi somewhere I may try to upload the longer 20min version in case anyone wants to veg out to muted diesel noises, occasional cursing, and great driving views.