Death Valley and Surrounds

So after I was done at White mountain, I drove to Death Valley NP. It was incredibly hot at the low elevations, but the huge park also includes mountain ranges where the exposure is still intense but the temps stay much more moderate. I camped in such an area and it was really nice - just slept under the stars in my lightweight sleeping bag. The stars in this area were the best I've seen on the trip.

It was stinking hot in Death Valley in august... huh, who would have thought. I did some off-roading in the flat areas of the desert. Jessica held up as best as she could. After Death Valley I drove down to my friend Mark's place in San Diego, where I'm posted up for several days. Going to do some work on the car to shore it up for the long drive back east. And seriously, the poor thing has taken a beating this summer - huge mountain passes, 9500 miles so far...

Anyway, Mark is a former college roommate and good friend of mine who has a job here and a nice apartment. His girlfriend who I also know from school is currently visiting too, so I'm doing a great job as third wheel as we go out and see some of the town, hang out on the beach, and just bum around the apartment - it's nice to be clean and comfortable again. As I drove down from Death Valley to San Diego, I sat in LA traffic while listening to old-timey Mexican music on the radio and felt very SoCal. I also saw the remnants of the Manzanar Japanese internment camp - it was just a brief drive-through unfortunately but still a powerful experience. Although I hopefully have almost another month to go on the trip, I'm feeling like my time hiking White mtn. and dabbling in Death Valley was (hopefully) the last big adventure of this trip. I had an evening driving into Death Valley that didn't work out exactly as planned, and with Jessica hurting somewhat, temps still over 100 in the valleys at night, and my information to navigate to the campsite very limited, I thought, this is getting a little old. Everything worked out fine, but I'm still pretty ok with having no more evenings like that one, and having a few more people to visit along the way back east instead of more camping excursions.

Mining ghost town building.