Day 4 begins at Mosaic Canyon. We got up with the sun, as usual. Mosaic Canyon is one of the reasons we decided to try climbing. It is a easy hike that winds through the canyon, but at some point, it ends unless you can climb and continue through the canyon.
It is a beautiful canyon. It is one of my most favorite places in Death Valley. It is pretty crowded (even early in the morning) where the canyon begins. There are little climbs that you have to get through to continue and people who don't really like to hike and/or people with small children, never get farther. There is a bigger, somewhat easy climb at some point and most people will stop there. If you continue farther though, you end up at a 40 foot wall that you basically need rope in order to scale.
Luckily, we went prepared! It took us a while though because some of it is just smooth marble that was difficult to protect. Christian ended up going up and around to an easier part for him to free climb and top roped us up the wall. He had to make this massive anchor in order to help us up. That wall pretty much stopped the rest of the people from continuing.
The canyon just gets more beautiful as you go up. Unfortunately, I did not bring my camera when I made the climb up so I didn't get any more pictures. Christian got some when he went back up though. The canyon continued on a little more before coming to another wall. It also had some awesome side canyons that were just stunning as well. Unfortunately, we did not have enough time to get our gear up and continue on this trip so we had to call it a day.
We had plans to watch the sun set on the Mesquite Flats sand dunes and needed to head out. I think that we will have to devote more time to Mosaic Canyon the next time we come. When we finally got to the dunes, Christian and I wished that we just stayed at the canyon because the dunes were just crawling with people. It was like watching ants on an anthill. The girls loved it though. They love playing on the sand dunes.
Our camping spot was kind of central to all the places we were visiting so we stayed there again. It is a comfortable spot away from any people. We just had to get up early and pack up before other people started moving about as there was no cover to shelter us from the view of others once the sun came up.
Early on Day 5, we headed into Golden Canyon. This is another one of the areas that neither Christian nor I have had the chance to explore yet. Incidentally, it is also the place where some of the original Star Wars Episode IV was filmed along with Mesquite Flats Sand Dunes which we visited yesterday evening. The kids got a kick out of that.
At the end of Golden Canyon sits the Red Cathedral which is pretty breath taking.
From there, we continued on to Zabriskie's Point which we found really crowded as well. We hiked in from Golden Canyon but you can just drive there which is what most people did.
We took some pictures and quickly took our leave as the place was just packed with loud tourists.
From there, we headed through the 20 mule team canyon. It is also a one way route that you drive through. It was crowded and unimpressive. We had the same problems running into people that just stopped in the middle of the road oblivious to those around them (and in back of them). We did not stop to take pictures and proceeded right back out and on our way to Dante's View.
There were lots of people there as well but we found some places to ourselves and decided to watch the sunset. The the cockroaches started to climb over us to see the sunset as well, we figured it was time to take our leave.
We went back to the ranger station to wash up, fill up on water and have our dinner. We called Christian's brother that evening to see if they were in Lone Pine where they had planned to spend the night. Apparently, they had not left but were planning to leave early in the morning to meet us in the afternoon. We then went back to our campsite which was feeling a lot more like home now that we've spent so many nights there.
Day 6 was another traveling day. We planned to head out of the main part of Death Valley and into Eureka to meet up with Christian's family. We stopped by to show the girls Scotty's Castle. Luckily, it was still early. It was not open yet and so there were only a few people milling about.
It is a tourist trap, but a really beautiful one. The place and workmanship is just stunning. By the time we headed out, all the people started pouring in so we got out in the nick of time.
We got into Eureka Valley just after noon. We set up camp and had our lunch and waited for Christian's dad and brother. We figured that they might not be able to see our car from the main road so Christian went out to the main road to wait for them. We sat around and waited for hours but no one showed up. We sent the girls to play on the sand dunes and kept in contact with them through walkie talkies. They would call every now and then to see if Grandpa had arrived yet. They were so excited that they were coming out to meet us.
We met up with the girls again and we were starting to get really worried about what might possibly be detaining them. After grabbing a snack, Christian and I took one last walk out to the main parking lot to see if we could find them, to no avail. We returned to make dinner. Every time we saw a car drive into the valley, the kids or Christian would run out to the road to see what kind of vehicle it was. It was never them. The temperature dropped really quickly with the sun and we had to retreat into the tent. It was super cold there. Luckily, we brought a heater. We had not yet had any use for it but boy did we need it here. We were afraid that it would singe our tent or our expensive sleeping bags but it was so cold, we left the heater on all night...well, until it ran out of fuel. We do not have a four season tent that fits all four of us, so the tent has vents that the heat just rises out of and we are not able to keep in nice and warm like our four season tent. You knew when the gas ran out because it got pretty cold fast. We estimate that the temperature got down to at least 24˚F.
It was still pretty cold when we got up in the morning. As Christian's brother and father never arrived, we figured that we would climb to the top of the sand dune. It is the highest dune field in North America. The last time we came, we could not keep up with the girls and never made it to the top. I still couldn't keep up with the girls but Christian easily passed them up. We all made it to the top in short time. Christian couldn't enjoy himself though because he kept going back and forth between being pissed off that we wasted half our day waiting for his family to come and being worried that something might have happened to them.
Christian headed back down and I stayed a while at the top to watch the girls play. They kept sliding down and climbing back up. I don't know where they keep all their energy. They finally came back up to have a snack. We decided that we better head back down to Christian to see what the plan was.
The girls were disappointed that they didn't see any fighter jets. They had yesterday off because of the New Year's holiday but we figured that they would be out and about today. Just as we were about to head down, a couple of F-16s streaked by.
They were fully armed with missiles! We waited around a bit for them to whip back around but it seemed like they were on their way somewhere as they were not as playful as they normally are. They did not come back so we proceeded back down. Every time we heard an airplane, we stopped to pull out our cameras but they were just commercial airplanes flying by.
When we made it back down, Christian was packing up to go. We decided that if Christian's family was not coming, we would just start heading home as none of us wanted to spend another freezing cold night out there in the dunes. We had been out for 7 days and were ready to be home in our own beds.
As we were driving out of the valley, three more fighters came up over the mountain range and over our vehicle. The last airplane was just a stone's throw above us. We were so excited to get a last farewell from the fighter jets. Incidentally, they were all also fully armed with missiles.
We ran into a bunch of snow through one of the mountain passes and stopped so that the girls could play.
The snow would not stick together enough to make snow men or anything but the kids and some fun throwing snow balls.
We got into Lone Pine in time for a late lunch. After lunch, we headed into Alabama Hills to have some last minute fun before heading home. We went back to climb on the
Lost Eye to the Moon which we started climbing back in October.
This time, Christian and I managed to make it to the top of "Eye for an Eye", a short two pitch climb that we started last time but was not quite ready to finish.
It was gratifying to see how we have progressed since the last time we were here. Caitlyn was able to climb "Fiddlin Buckeroo" without a rope. Emily climbed the "Riders of the Purple Sage" that Christian and I climbed last time as the last of the daylight faded away. We stayed until the sun went down. Caitlyn climbed "Rootin' Tootin' Rhythm" in the dark! I think that somewhere between the climbing gym and now, Caitlyn has finally started to get over her fear of climbing. We have been amazed at how well she did in the canyons, as well as here in Alabama Hills.
The girls had made a little friend while Christian and I were climbing. She is between Emily and Caitlyn's age and was there climbing with her family. Emily was excited to meet another little girl with common interests.
They were there for a long time but left some time after it got dark. We stayed and had our dinner before hitting the road. We got back late but was never happier to come home and be able to take a shower and get into our nice warm, soft beds.
