Trip to Death Valley and Sequoia for Memorial Day

Nov 25,26, 2008

For this Memorial Day weekend, Kalyan, my best friend from BHU, who now lives in Texas, visited us. We had originally planned to go to Lassen Volcanic National Park, but on Saturday evening e changed our plans since we found out that it was going to rain all weekend at Lassen. We decided to go to Death Valley National Park and then to Sequoia National Park. We found a motel in Ridgecrest, CA, not too far from Death Valley (about an hour) but remote enough to keep the costs low. We took 101S, 152W, 5S, 58W, 14N. By the time we reached Ridgecrest it was past midnight. We had lots of leftover food from a reunion party at our house and we took it with us and ate it for dinner, and then slept soundly.

We woke up early the next day and started off towards Death Valley on 395N, entering the valley via 190E. The day was sunny and fabulous. The scenery was spectacular. I have been here about five times and yet the place did not fail to amaze me. The giant cacti, joshua trees, dry lakes, desert vegetation and the mountains.

Death Valley is immense and ordinarily takes more than a day to cover in its entirety. We realized that we had time only for the Ubehebe crater and Badwater basin. It was noon by the time we reached Stovepipe Wells, which is a tiny town at the heart of Death Valley and the only place with any civilization for miles. We were low on gas and the price at Stovepipe Wells was $4.50, so we decided to fill 5 gallons, just enough to travel to the places of interest to us and leave. We were starving by this time, so we picnicked here with some delicious dondakaya kobbarikaya koora and perugu.

We reached Ubehebe crater at about 1:30 in the afternoon. The crater was created by an immense explosion when a stream of underground water came in contact with a stream of lava and instantaneously produced tremendous pressures due to the sudden creation of steam. The crater is 770 feet deep and over a mile wide and is quite awe inspiring. Apparently Ubehebe means "great basket in the rock" in Native American. We decided to hike down to the bottom of the crater.

We made it down to the bottom in about 15-20 minutes and it was an amazing feeling standing at the center of the crater surrounded by the immense walls, imagining the process that created it. The hike down seems quite precarious at first, especially since at some points it is quite steep. After spending some time inside the crater, we started to climb up. It is definitely a tough hike back, partly because of the height, but also because much of the path is made up of very loose gravel that makes it hard to get a good foothold. It was almost like climbing up a sand dune. It took us about half an hour, several pauses to catch breath and lots of huffing and puffing to reach the top. It was 3:00 pm by the time we reached the top and we immediately headed off towards Badwater Basin - the lowest point on land in the U.S. On our way there we saw a coyote. We had seen coyotes before - canines that bear a striking resemblance to wolves or foxes or Alsatian dogs - and while they are not generally very large, this one looked particularly emaciated.

Badwater Basin is 282 feet below sea level and an extremely outlandish place, at first looking like it's straight out of a science fiction novel. Rainstorms and flash floods accompanied by the formidable evaporation rate leaves behind immense plains of nothing but white, crumbly salt. In peak summer, the salt forms interesting hexagonal patterns on the plain, making it look even more surreal.

It was about 5:30 by the time we left Badwater. We decided to stay the night at Bakersfield, about an hour or so from the Sequoia area. We took 190W, 395S, 14S, 58W, 99N to Bakersfield. We called Mani who helped us find an Indian restaurant in Bakersfield (Taj Mahal Cuisine of India). We were racing to get to the city, and the restaurant closes at 10, so we called them up and placed our order over the phone. We reached the restaurant at 10:10 P.M - about 10 minutes after it closed. However, the owner was nice enough to keep the place open until we could get there. We checked into a Motel 6, exhausted, had a scrumptious meal and fell asleep instantly.

We started early again the next day, drove up 99N and took 180E towards Sequoia National Park. On the way, we stopped at Three Rivers point by the Kaweah lake. It is one of the most beautiful areas I have seen. Aparna and I have decided we need to come here again and spend more time.

Out first stop at Sequoia was Crystal Cave, a cavern with stalactite and stalagmite formations. There was a lot of fog and driving conditions in Sequoia were pretty bad with less than 10 m visibility. All of us had seen caverns before and were not significantly impressed. The hike to the caves however, was spectacular with some amazing waterfalls on the way. I took a lot of photos, and in some of them, managed to get us all wet, when I put my arm around Aparna and we slipped on the wet rock and fell into the stream!!

After Crystal Cave we went to see General Sherman - the largest tree in the world. No mater how many times I see this tree, it continues amazes me. It is over 2,200 years old, is about 3 miles wide, and stands at an impressive height of about 275 feet. In other words, it is older than the Buddha, wide enough to build a small apartment in, and so tall, that you can't see its top branches. We paid our reverences to the tree (see picture with the "General Sherman" sign) and then headed back home. We reached home at 12:02 a.m, exhausted, but very happy.

Another feather in our Fabulous Trip cap.