Wednesday, June 3, 2015

Wandering in the Desert



Sunday... The conference over, the group scattered... I  traveled south in convoy with a few other cars, stopping to look at railroad remains along the way... Dropping into the Owens Valley at Mt Montgomery Pass... Slipping back into California at Benton...  The White Mountains and the Sierra peaks still snow capped from recent storms...

The group broke up just north of Bishop...  I stopped at Laws to look at their turntable and the depot....  The 100+ year old wooden turntable is sagging and won't turn... A friend had asked me to take a look...  The depot needs paint, and some want to keep the "old weathered look"... Others just want to paint it... I wanted to take a look for myself.  I am in the paint it camp...

I stopped for supplies in Bishop for supplies... Gas, ice, and sunscreen... Then south through big pine, lone pine and Independence,  then headed east, pausing in Keeler before crossing the Panamints, dropping into Panamint Valley the over Towne pass and into Death Valley...








Once in the Park, I stopped at the visitor's center to show the magic card and jet the little blue piece of paper for the windshield that says I have paid my entrance fee.   It was 118 degrees… they were having the first heat wave of the season.  I got a room at the Furnace Creek Ranch, then made my way down to Badwater to watch the landscape change as the sun went down...

It was dark by the time I returned... I had something to eat then sat outside in the heat and checked email...

The next morning I took my time getting up, then headed south... This time on the un paved west road, pausing at Eagle Borax works... Now just a mound of mud...  Regaining pavement 40 miles later... Then over the hills, startling a turkey vulture as I crested Jacobs pass... Reaching Shoshone, where I picked up gas and visited the local museum, then to Baker where the world's largest thermometer has been renovated by a local radio station... It said it was 97 degrees, but the Jeep (which seemed to agree with the Death Valley thermometer said it was 102...

From Baker I  dropped south through Kelso and the old railroad depot hotel and “club”, now National Park Service Visitor center and Amboy... in Amboy I found the right of way with ties for both the railroad that ran on Bristol lake... one abandoned in the 1920's.... then on to Daggett... last evening on my own I found a couple of sites including a railroad that used mules to pull (empty) cars up hill and gravity to let them (now loaded) roll down... the mules either rode down on flat cars or were only fed at the bottom, so released and found their own way down... 

Tuesday I met with a young local rail fan (and grandparents) and we found significant traces of the American Borax and Calico and Daggett railroads, then followed the Borate and Daggett its full length...  Beyond we found the short lived Palm Borate…  the tall bridge site and the tunnel…
On the back side of Calio Mountain I saw I spotted a roadrunner… There were no Coyotes or acme products to be seen… Luckily there were no snakes… this is snake territory, Mojave Greens… I didn’t need to see snakes… 

Dinner at one of the two diners… Peggy’s and Penny’s… both stainless steel with counters and booths… 

On to Arizona tomorrow…out of the Mojave desert and into Mohave County...

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