It’s a “dry” heat

Oakdale, CA was the last Holiday Inn Express on our quick tour. It would have been nice to see the view when driving in and the breakfast was getting to me as being the same thing it had been for days.

A quick nights stay and we got on the road and headed East on highway 120, it’s THE road for Yosemite. A few planned stops for today just to see the surrounding and keep heading on.

I can tell you now, I didn’t think I was rushing through, and I really enjoyed the view. But if even if you plan to drive through, see if you can add in another week. Stay at Yosemite Valley, camping, glamping or they have all the modern amenities you need, even have a bus to take you to hiking paths.

Yosemite

We made a pretty quick trip through overall, and made it to Lee Vining, CA for a slightly late lunch at Bodie Mike’s. Good enough for me to recommend that if you are in Lee Vining, stop here!

Before booking it straight to Bishop, we took a few small detours around the June Lake Loop, and the Mammoth Scenic Loop. Both just off 395 and worth it. I’m sure if we were there in the winter it would have been full of snow, and both areas looked on the expensive side.

Our stop in Bishop, CA was a short one. It was merely a quick stop closer to Death Valley so we didn’t have to drive so far the next day to get to Vegas. Note to travelers: take your time, stop a day more than you think you should, we found Erick Schat’s Bakkery, a treasure if you are into bakeries!

With a small case of water in the car, and our things more loosely packed each day, we headed on through Death Valley, deadline rental car drop-off time.

The first thing to know about Death Valley, it get’s HOT.

The second thing to know about Death Valley, it’s a lot less of a valley then you think it would be.

There’s a mountain range that runs right down the middle of the National Park lines, so if you are on 190 going East, you hit one valley,

  • Entering Death Valley
  • West Death Valley
  • Death Valley – where we are headed

then mountains, then another Valley to get to

  • Death Valley – Looking back at the “first” valley
  • Death Valley – Looking towards the next
  • Death Valley – Into the main valley

Stovepipe wells. They have a POOL, should have stayed here… Maybe next time.

  • Stovepipe Wells –

This place is at 10′ above sea level, and it was 110°F at 8:30am when we were there. 40 miles southeast of this at Badwater basin it gets to 282 ft below sea level, and 25 miles southeast is where the world record of 134°F is held. They have a resort too!

And at this point, you just forget to take more pictures cause it’s all looking about the same.

  • Dry

Finally in Nevada, Google Maps says one thing, the road signs say another?

We passed through Indian Springs (check out the artistic map below), and tried to head to Sedan Crater, but learning later it’s only open during specific times and you have to take a tour that starts in Vegas. It’s also on the other side of more interesting sites such as Area 51, and Mercury, NV, the last “closed city” in the United States.

  • Indian Springs Gas Station 10:04

Since we couldn’t make it to the Crater, we had some extra time and decided to drive right past Vegas and go drive past Hoover Dam!

  • Hoover Dam(n) Parking
  • Hoover Dam

Grabbed some lunch in Boulder City, and I HIGHLY recommend The Dillinger for their food. Then back into Vegas, drop of the bags, drop of the rental car and just as my first trip to Taiwan was with Shahar, I was back with staying with Shahar!

tl;dr – New rule for future trips for us, stay a minimum of 4 days, it’s hot in deserts but “dry”, wanna see some government crap, schedule it with the government…

Leave a Reply