The Great Prius Adventure: Beatty & the Spicer Ranch

Headed over to Beatty to see if it had changed much since the last time I was there back a couple decades ago. It seemed bigger, but maybe not. Stopped at the small museum to ask a few questions regarding what to do in the area...the museum person said that we should head over and check out the Spicer Ranch where you can bike ride, hike, camp and so forth. We jokingly asked about showers and she said she thought they were set up for that as well.

So off we went in search of the ranch. When we arrived, we were pretty amazed to find a very large tract of land set aside for mountain biking with a little donations box.

There were teenagers from Las Vegas participating in a mountain bike race. We watched for a bit, talked to a lady who turned out to be one of the owners of the place, and ended up taking advantage of the wonderful shower facilities. And yes, we left a donation!

On our way back to Beatty, we decided to look for a few Geocaches, though we passed up the one at the old Angel's Landing (think red light). Ended up finding one right on the highway in front of a place that sells every kind of military ammo can and other boxes that you can imagine. Had quite a conversation with the owner -- nice guy, but a bit on the conspiracy theory side of life.

The Great Prius Adventure: Death Valley to Rhyolite

Rolled out of the back of the Prius this morning and made our way to Zabriskie Point to view the sunrise.

No time to get dressed, so we just took our coffee making resources and hiked up to the point in our pajamas!

We stopped and set up our camp stove to make a relaxing breakfast at Hells Gate (Death Valley National Park) before heading out to Rhyolite and the Goldwell Open Air Museum.

The Great Prius Adventure: Death Valley

After spending a couple of days with Mom, we headed to Death Valley for some warm weather and desert camping. We were pretty pleased to find a campsite at Texas Springs - the one campground that does not allow generators. So, we bought a pass for three nights and got busy enjoying the sights.

Texas Springs Campground	Shade across from our site!
View up the road.	Shower Time Prius car doors come in handy!

As most tourists to Death Valley do, we checked out the Furnace Creek Visitor Center, though it was only about 80 degrees, so not much of a furnace! The exhibits were updated since my last visits -- and it was really, really awesome to see two miners highlighted in the displays: one male and one female. So cool. There was also a really great display about the native people of the area, the Timbisha Shoshone.

We also took advantage of the ranger talk at the old Harmony Borax Works site. Again, the talks have been updated to include a variety of perspectives as well as the natural environment.

 

Furnace Creek Visitor Center

Harmony Borax Works

Our next day, we took the Golden Canyon Trail/Badlands/Gower Gulch Loop hike. Clocking in around 4.6 miles, I wish we would have had our poles at a couple of points.   

 

Tip: If you go - bring plenty of water and prepare for total sun exposure. If you are at all nervous about heights, you might skip this hike.