Dante's Peak

The only hike we could safely do in Death Valley was at dusk to watch the sunset from the top of Dante's Peak. We were up so high and there was a nice cool breeze blowing....such a welcome reprieve! Joey celebrated the ascent by downing a can of Trader Joe's mocha caffe. As you can see, Jonas spent most of his time building rock cairn! We had fun taking pictures...a great ending to our day!

Below Sea Level

Badwater....the lowest spot in the western hemisphere. If you notice a small rectangle sign on the mountainside (above our car), you can't read it but it says "sea level" to give you perspective.

The Ultimate Artist!

The praise music was blaring all day in the Haywood vehicle as we worshipped our amazing Creator, for His beautiful splendor throughout Death Valley! We hadn't expected it to be so colorful! The IPad never does the photos justice, but God used a palette of pastel hues including pink, purple, mint green and even teal among the rads, oranges, browns & grays. It was soo beautiful! We marveled at God's creativity in the geological diversity within the park: sand dunes, salt flats, painted canyons, etc.

120 degrees

So of course we just happened to be cruising through Death Valley during the hottest month of the year! The average high for July is 115, the forecast called for 118 yesterday (the highest this week), but the park ranger said we hit 120! So now we have experienced both extremes: the nose-biting, eyelash & nosehair freezing, lung-numbing bitter cold of Alaska AND the skin-blistering, eyeball-singeing, and lung-burning heat of Death Valley! Most of our photos were taken from the car; we got out as little as possible because it hurt to breath, our skin felt like it was on fire and our eyeballs literally felt like they were burning, no exaggeration! I've never experienced a hot wind like that; it was an unpleasant, but interesting sensation. Of course we had to get out at the main point-of-interest spots, but we kept the stops short. At one point Anissa actually felt dizzy, light-headed & tingly so Joey had to help her back to the car. Alea also said she felt sick to her stomach, so we had to be careful with her because she actually threw up in Africa one time from getting over-heated. The hard part was that we had to turn off the AC when we were driving up elevation (which was often; we were in & out of valleys all day). One time we tried to leave the AC on but the car over heated and started blowing hot air, so we had to grin & bear it! Despite all this we had such a neat trip through Death Valley!

Salt!

There were salt flats and then there was a place they say the land is so jaggedy (from the salt crustations) that only the devil could play golf on it. Of course we all had to taste the salt from Death Valley!

Last stop before Death Valley!

We were fortunate to have friends right on the way, and to have people to stay with 2 nights in a row. It was soo good to catch up with Telissa (who Joey & Anissa went to Goshen College with AND lived up in Alaska with) and her family. The visit was full of treats: cold cereal, microwave popcorn (both things our kids had been missing), video games & a movie! Plus Jonas got to go to the last night of VBS with their boys and enjoyed lots of "boy time" involving burping, wrestling, rough play and all the things boys love! We also got a much-needed oil change and a couple other errands taken care of....all & an awesome stop on our journey.