Flung northwest by about 50 miles is a satellite community called Pahrump, NV. This city town is of the size of 20,000 souls give or take with a sizable community of snowbirds. We elected to stay here in Pahrump to take advantage of electric and water for a while. We stayed at Wine Ridge RV resort on the eastern edge of town as a respite of sorts. Sometimes we simply need to hook up, so to speak, if for no other reason than to give the generator a needed rest. Staying at an RV resort is not our preference, while it is the preference of some folks. We’d rather stay on government land as usually these resorts are rather sterile, though our stay in Yuma at Caravan Oasis was a lot of fun. It has to do with the folks who stay there. Caravan Oasis has a snowbird population of fun-loving Canadians. Wine Ridge was populated with very nice folks, but mostly Americans. Americans seem to tend to stay to themselves or small Cliques.
We enjoyed our stay at Wine Ridge. It’s located on the very edge of national land, austere and beautiful at the same time. It is also, being in Pahrump, perched on the eastern rim of Death Valley, a place unlike any other on the planet Earth. I say “perched” on the rim of Death Valley because that best describes the area. Death Valley is a tremendous basin. It is the largest National Park in the lower 48 and most of it sits around sea level or lower, though parts of it are contained in the surrounding mountain ranges, primarily the Panamints. Pahrump sits at about 1500’ altitude.
Diane and I made several forays into Death Valley. We apparently missed a tremendous flower bloom that occurred this year due to the very wet winter they thankfully had this year. We also missed a huge temporary lake that appeared in the Valley that was some 29 miles long. However, the timeless and stark beauty of the planet as seen in the Valley was there, as always. Time slows to a crawl here.
Because of the nature of the Valley, one gets the opportunity to see the various strata and sub-strata of the planet as formed over billions of years. Jutting every which way, huge rock shelves of any number of compositions and colors tumble over each other competing for the stage as it were. The pans of salt, miles in length and width, are impossible to ignore. Crusty crystalline elements gleam in the purified and salted sun of the basin. It’s impossibly bright, as if you were in a bathtub with a detective’s inquisitive spotlight shining down from above. However, when a storm arrives, as one did while we were there, the contrasting dark colors of the storm clouds and the sweeping torrents of rain and virga form a welcome relief to overcooked eyes. The contrasts and sweeping vistas of colored rock and earth are more than amazing.
As we’ve seen in most National Parks, foreign visitors dominate; French, German, Polish, Chinese, Korean, buses of Japanese retirees. It seems fitting and proper that the tumbling and jumbling array of landscape is visited by the same in humankind. We decided to hike one day and took a rather short 3 mile hike through a narrow, winding canyon. Even in April, it was reaching 105 degrees there. We repeatedly and often sought out narrow strands of shade that the canyon walls provided to rest and hydrate. There we would meet and greet visitors from across the ocean who invariably came to our shores not just once, but repeatedly, to experience the wonders of America’s National Parks and geologic wonders. Is the lack of domestic visitors simply because Americans are not taking their vacations yet? Is it because Americans have had to become super-productive and work insanely to keep their homes and property and health insurance? Why do folks from other countries seemingly have more leisure time? We often wonder about this.
I think that what confounded and delighted me the most about this place is the presence of water. Water is always the most powerful tool in God’s toolbox and here in Death Valley he uses it seemingly to remind us that life finds a way to thrive, even in the hottest place on the planet. This year there is beautiful snow pack on Mount Washington that towers over Pahrump. The Panamint mountains are also draped in brilliant white mantles. Back at ground level, Ash Meadows appears as a protected environment where the Master gives us life and sustenance amid the harshest challenges. Here you have springs of ancient water emanating from deep within the crust of the earth bubbling to the surface and creating micro climates that allow highly specialized living to occur. At one time there were rivers and connected lakes that coursed through this basin and adjoining areas of Nevada and California. Over time they dried up as the environment changed leaving small, isolated springs. Life within these springs evolved singularly, apart from other nearby springs. A case in point are pupfish. While present in most of these small springs, they have evolved into varying colors and sizes. Within the principal spring of Ash Meadows there exists a blue luminescent version, much like a tropical fish. In other springs they may appear brown or green. In one spring in particular there lives one version of this species that lives almost entirely on one rock shelf. Though the spring is more than 600’ deep, these pupfish cling entirely to one squarish shelf of rock not quite as large as an average living room floor. And, as I mentioned before, this water is ancient. They say it ages 10,000 years before it completes its incredible journey through the cracks and crevices of the desert to percolate up through the holes in the desert floor. Ancient seems to be the recurring thought here in the Valley. Amazement, awe and appreciation are the emotions.