Driving through Death Valley was hot with temperatures nearing 100 and this is the cool season! We camped in Panamint Springs that night. As soon as we got out of the car the camp host told us to get out of the sandals and into shoes or boots - they have rattlesnakes and scorpions!
The next morning we had school and then headed off to explore more of Death Vall
ey. We stopped at Furnace Creek and t
hen the Dunes. There are sand dunes in the
mi
ddle of Death Valley - where do they come from?? We also saw lots of dust devils. You see a little sand moving then you see t
wo thin lines twist up and form a mini tornado. They were all around us, it was pretty cool. We also stopped at the salt lake. We hiked down to walk on it, it felt like you were walking on frozen ground as it crunched under your feet. There were smooth round bubbles of salt and inside there were long thin slivers of salt
connecting the sides of the bubble, they looked like stalagtites. We were below sea level! We drove on and stopped at Zabriskie's lookout. What a view. The rocks were rounded and there were smooth worn cliffs. You could look down across the valley - it was so beautiful.The drive down to Las Vegas was more desert.
Just before Las Vegas we saw Red Rocks in the distance. The rocks were sooo red!!!
We Stopped and camped at Lake Mead. Lake Mead has 550 miles of shoreline and was created when they built the Hoover Dam. The campground was great with these little birds with tuffs on their head ran all around. There was lots of Oleander which they warn you is very poisonous. We could walk down to the lake and swim. It was a long walk because the lake was quite low. We learned later they are in the 7th or 8th year of a drought. The lake was warm but weedy.
Next morning we were up early and off to the Hoover Dam. It was really cool. We did the tour and walked inside the dam and the power plant. To start construction of the Dam they built four tunnels to reroute the Colorado River. The Dam is 221.3 m high and 13.7m wide at the top and the base is 201.2 m wide! It is 379.2m long. They started construction in 1931 and finished in 1935. They used 2.6 million cubic metres of concrete. To help it set they put long pipes went in through the concrete squares and cooled the concrete - if they hadn't done it the concrete would have taken 125 years to cool which meant it would have cracked and crumbled.
The have 17 commercial generators in the power plant and the maximum power is 2.08 GW. They moved all the big stuff with trains and you could see the rails in the plant.
One side of the dam is Nevada and the other is Arizona.
We drove on to Zion Canyon. Driving was boring again, mostly
desert and dry hills. Once we reached Zion is was dark and the campground was full so we camped just outside. Next morning we were up early and found a spot in the park. There was a great creek for puddling and swimming. We stayed for two days. So far it is the most beautiful place we've visited. We hiked to Angel's Landing, it was a very steep hike with a stunning view of the canyon. You took little shuttle buses around the canyon so there was not much traffic. There were lots of little hikes into magical places with names like "The Emerald Pools" (they were named that because the algae made them look green). There are waterfalls and a place called the "Weeping Rock" where the water seeps out of the rock to create these wonderful hanging gardens.
The canyon stared as sand dunes, 3 times higher than the dunes in the Sahara. An inland lake formed, covering the dunes and hardening them into sandstone. Then the Virgin River began to cut its way down through the rock to form the canyon. Some rock broke off in arches and some in squares so you see different shapes throughout the canyoon. The fantastic colours of the canyon come from the minerals either running down and staining the rock, or leaching out of the rock. You see reds, yellows, desert varnish (black), white. You also see green when it rains but that is a moss growing on the rock which becomes a vivid green whe
n exposed to water.
The second day we went on a walk with the Ranger at the Temple of Sinawava. It was called the Riverwalk and it ends at a place called the Narrows. The talk was interesting, they have a really small snail only found in the park and they live on the walls where the water seeps from the rocks. The ranger told a great Paiute story about the angry rocks which explains why rocks can't walk.
It went something like this:
One day two gods were talking and decided what they made was a bit boring so they said "everything take a shape" and the gods walked around and named the shapes: animals, mountains, trees etc. Then they came across a shape that had fallen off the mountain and didn't have a name. It could only roll. It was angry and it rolled and tumbled after
the gods until Night Hawk came to save the gods. She dove and dove at the rock, beating the rock with her chin and wings. Finally the rock broke up and the gods decided to punish the rock so they decided that all rocks that fell off the mountain would break into many small bits. The Paiute don't walk in the Zion canyon because the angry rocks might fall at anytime. It also explains why the night hawk has the white markings under the wings and chin - that is where the gods bandaged her after she beat the rocks.
Time was getting short so we had to make a choice: Bryce Canyon, Grand Canyon or straight to Joshua Tree. We took a vote and 2 voted for Grand Canyon so off we
went. The drive wasn't boring it was spectacular. There were huge cliffs, banded with so many different shades of red and we passed this field of rocks balanced on little points. You could see where the sand had been worn out around them and they were left on tippy toes - it was amazing that they didn't fall over! We chose the North Rim because it was less visited so we hoped t
o have fewer people for a change. We stopped at Jacob's Lake to set up camp and then drove on to the Canyon. WOW. We were all very glad we visited the Canyon - it was spectacular and amazing.
More about the canyon tomorrow .......
