On the northern side of Anza Borrego there are the remains of an old calcite mine. In operation around WWII, they mined optical calcite for use in gunsights. It didn’t last long, since around the same time a synthetic alternate was discovered, making the mining of calcite financially no longer feasible. What is left are [...]
Dec 102008
Our last full day of the annual Thanksgiving Trip to the desert was an adventure! We decided to do the run up Warm Springs canyon into Butte Valley, but instead of continuing through the valley and up towards Mengel Pass, we turned off towards Arrastre Springs to explore that area. The day was primarily spent [...]
Our fourth day in the desert was a half day since we had to get to Vegas. We headed out of the park to the east, towards Searchlight, and took a quick detour to the Hart Townsite just outside of the park boundary. Hart was a small town of about 400 gold miners, and there [...]
Dec 052007
After a couple days of fun in Las Vegas we hit the road to join a group of friends in Death Valley for Thanksgiving. Our meeting place was the old trailer park on BLM land just outside of the park. This is an interesting place – once a trailer park for local miners, it is [...]
After our eventful day in Zion National Park we drove the short distance to Bryce Canyon National Park. Arriving after dark, we didn’t get to enjoy the scenery until the next morning. We got up early and were in the park just around sunrise, which we enjoyed from Sunset Point. Sunrise at Bryce is amazing, [...]
Our trip started with the long drive out to Zion National Park. We arrived on Saturday night, just in time for sunset. After sunset we checked into our hotel, the Pioneer Lodge in Springdale. This was my favorite hotel of our vacation. The decor was great and the beds were really comfy. I’m sure that [...]
Sep 042007
Today was the day I said goodbye to my hiking friends and headed off on my own. While Mary, Michael, and Kerry continued south, I left the JMT to head east through Piute Canyon. My goal for the night was to camp somewhere in Humphrey’s Basin. I had heard that Piute Canyon was beautiful, and [...]
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