As we enter Spooky Season, I thought I would bring up something that has been on my mind for the last couple of years. 

In all my travels across the US and many many Nat'l/State Parks/Preserves/Monuments I've heard story upon story of different legends in almost every region I've been to.  Ghostly wagon trains, supernatural phenomenon, women in white, UFOs, mysterious lights, Cryptids of all descriptions from Sasquatch to Thunderbirds to more classics like Will-o-the-Wisps or Pukwudgies. .  

But I rarely hear anything at all about what haunts or creeps in Death Valley!  For such a legendary place with such an ominous name (not to mention how many people have died or been lost in the area) there seem to be so few spooky stories. 

I know that the 29 Palms area and part of the Mojave have the Yucca Man (desert sasqautch variety).  


I have heard the legend of a huge cave under the Panamints that held mummified giants and loads of Egyptian-style riches, marrying two popular legends of Egyptian-type ancient civilizations in the West with the old tales of giant humaniods.  Apparently 2 or 3 groups of people have been lost trying to re-find the cave after first stumbling into it prospecting, never to return. 



The Shoshone and other tribes have legends of the Water/Rock Babies, small humanoids that inhabit springs & rocks that protect water sources and come out at night to carve petroglyphs and/or lure people to their doom. 

But I have not heard of much else.  And I have not experienced anything spooky or unexplainable in my many many nights in the park. Other than one of the early Space-X satellite launches that had me thinking that I was witnessing a full scale alien invasion unfolding overhead.

Does anyone have any tales of the paranormal or the supernatural, of monsters or mysterious lights in Death Valley?  Or is the place itself, the unforgiving land and ruthless environs, the only villain necessary?

I did find this utterly IDIOTIC representation of a denizen of the supposed cave of mummified giants that was illustrated by someone who...  apparently never even read the legend?  I don't know.  What the hell man.

For the uninitiated, the supposed giant cave mummies were just overly large corpses mummified by the desert climate.  None were EVER mentioned to be ambulatory or anywhere but entombed in the mysterious caverns (which ran for miles under the Panamints).  No curse is mentioned (beyond the poor decision making by those that have gone looking for it, never to return). 

But I guess that gives you an idea of how much anyone is scraping the bottom of the barrel to come up with a Death Valley Monster of any kind. 

(2024-10-05, 12:19 PM)Beardilocks Wrote: ... I have not experienced anything spooky or unexplainable in my many many nights in the park.  Other than one of the early Space-X satellite launches that had me thinking that I was witnessing a full scale alien invasion unfolding overhead. 

Does anyone have any tales of the paranormal or the supernatural, of monsters or mysterious lights in Death Valley?

I've read of the cave and extended length mummy.

In my years of pre-dawn commuting between home in Big Pine and work in Trona I've seen a myriad of strange lights, holographic phenomena and ultra high speed illuminated contrails from missile launches to the south in the China Lake B Range.

My scariest encounters were from sneaky fighter pilots coming from behind at super low altitude, numerous encounters with that. The one in which I thought I was going to die was a near head-on collision with a small plane attempting to take off after midnight north of the Ballarat road in Panamint Valley; I drove into yet another night time drug drop (I lived in Trona then, was coming home with my son after a day of mountain biking at Mammoth Mountain). Rounding a blind, uphill corner just west of the southern road into Saline Valley at speed and before dawn on CA190, I barely had time to react to the sight of a Chevy sedan parked in the travel lane with three men pissing in the road on the driver side. And on two occasions I had suspicious vehicles stalking me with lights out, following me for miles over attempts to shake them off by detours, stopping and starting.

"Holographic phenomena" sound pretty wild!

It's not at all surprising that the most creepy or dangerous scenarios that you've experienced have been caused by the human monsters. I hear that time & time again from paranormal enthusiasts: people are the most dangerous thing out there.