Death Valley – Part Three

Death Valley – Part Three!

In this video we explore the following areas:

• Darwin Falls
• Scotty’s Castle
• The Furnace Creek Area
• Dante’s View

As you have seen, Death Valley has many different faces!  Waterfalls, painted deserts, castles, salt flats and mountains, just to name a few. 

One of the most interesting features is Scotty’s Castle.  Built in the 1920’s as a vacation home it is a colorful slice of history.  Eventually the park service acquired the “castle” and conducted tours as a period museum with people dressed as they would have been dressed in the 20’s. The castle was as it would have been with the original furnishing  that had been beautifully preserved.  Then in 2015 about 3” of rain fell in a few hours and flooded the area, ripping out the road and depositing several feet of mud in the castle.  All of the furnishings were removed, restored and deposited in climate controlled storage.  The park service conducts limited “flood” tours by lottery and we were so lucky to have been granted a spot!  The renovations are almost complete and once done the furnishings will be returned and full tours will start again.  Seeing this was a special treat. To read more about this fascinating piece of history here is a link:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scotty’s_Castle 

We highly recommend visiting this national park.  This treasure has so much to offer and remember, this is the largest national park in the lower 48!

Enjoy the video!

Travel Update:

We will be spending a few days tent camping in Joshua Tree National Park and then we only have a couple more weeks in Borrego Springs before we start our big adventure up the California coast!