Having completed three Death Valley tours in the last month, I can say that it is still “The most beautiful nothing you will ever see”. Looking at the pictures, you can see there isn’t much there to see. But what is there is amazing and can really fuel all the senses.
Death Valley’s attraction is its history. Geological as well as human history. Each has its own story to tell as well as the story it tells of the two being intertwined. Death Valley cannot have one without the other. This is what feeds the visitors fascination and attraction to such a desolate part of the country.
On one tour, we were fighting the weather. Rain was on the horizon. Yet that added an element of surprise and beauty to the tour. Possible rain as the backdrop to being in the driest place on the western hemisphere. Many of the routes were closed due to flooding. Including Devils Golf Course.
Bad weather doesn’t stop the tour, it just gives the guests more to explore and absorb. This is the one tour where the camera never leaves my guests hands, let alone is put away. The low clouds, mixed with early season sunshine reflects off the rocks and shows the colors normally hidden by the blazing hot sun.
I always find the tour fun because the guests, who only a few hours ago were questioning their sanity for signing up for such a tour, are now wondering why they waited so long to do so. And they worry they may not have enough memory or film for their cameras because their friends back in Vegas or at home, are not going to believe what they are seeing.
They love the stories told of the gold miners and the early explorers. The mining of Borax and seeing the twenty-mule team marching out of the valley.
They look around, trying to imagine why anyone in their right mind would purposely come here to live and to work. Suddenly that desk job they have isn’t so bad.
On these tours, we exited through Rhyolite, an abandoned gold mining town that grew as fast as it collapsed. Looking at the ruins, you can see the effects of greed, vanished dreams and hope for the future. As much as we can see the damages of mankind and our thirst for more.
Our final route home takes us past truck stop brothels, military outposts and atomic test sites. The things they heard so much about, but could never believe existed. After a day in Death Valley, they now understand that anything is possible and believable.
