Nearly a Personal Record

[GowerGulch42]

It's been a difficult year. That's not strange by itself, and seems to be the rule rather than the exception, but I've been sort of able to fall back on an old source of solace in Death Valley. In the past 12 months, I've had five trips. I did that once before, back in 2013-14, when I lived a mere 4 hours away. I live in Portland, OR, mind you, so that's not terribly easy to do! Of those trips, two were for fun and three were for "work". I led two geology field trips, one for the Geological Society of America annual conference out of Anaheim (September) and one for a science enthusiasts' group which began and ended in Vegas (October). For those two trips, I visited in August, my first time in the height of summer. Lastly, I visited this last week to introduce my wife to DV. To my great relief, she loved it and can't wait to go back! Here are some highlights:


February

• Lake Manly
  
• Extraordinary high wind
  
• Geology exploring around Towne Pass
  
• First time to the top of the Mesquite Flat dunes
  
• Saw the "new" Ash Meadows visitor center, since I hadn't been there since 2010!
  
• Had strep throat the whole time
  

August

• Low altitude looking for geological (earthquake-related) features
  
• "Dead-Bird Canyon"
  
• Flew to LV and rented a sedan
  

September

• First time I got to visit with other geologists! I learned a lot from them, though not as much as they learned from visiting!
  
• Returned to the Trona Pinnacles, first time in probably 15 years?
  

October

• Arrived in DV a day early for some time to myself
  
• Spent an extra day in central NV for some interesting things
  
• Two rock art sites
  
• First time sleeping at Mesquite Spring
  
• Explored around Emigrant Springs
  
• Wandered around Devils Cornfield
  
• First DV bighorn sheep sighting, seen from Beatty Cutoff about a mile above the turnoff for Keane Wonder Mine
  

February

• Hunted for (and found) some of the salt pools on the Golfcourse
  
• Visited Natural Bridge for the first time in 15-20(?) years. I forgot how impressive it really is.
  
• Sunset Titus Canyon hike
  
• New moon, truly exceptional night sky
  
• Flew to LV and rented sedan
  

I took a lot of pictures. I'm working on actually getting good as a landscape photographer, so I'll post them as I'm ready. There's also a lot of big panoramas. I have more words and thoughts to share, but I'll get to that… eventually. It turns out that flying to LV, renting a car, and staying at SPW or Beatty does not cost too much more than driving, especially with my '01 Cherokee, so I'm probably going to do that more in the future.