Death Valley in July

Death Valley National Park in July?  Or…Are you insane? Yes and yes. When we were planning our National Parks Road Trip, adding Death Valley during the hottest time of year wasn’t in our original plan.  But then it turned out that we were practically driving right by it, and how could we drive by a National Park and NOT visit (we couldn’t).  So there we were. In Death Valley and it was about 120 degrees. I don’t even care if it was a “dry” heat.  It was hot.

We read all of the warnings. Our tires might melt, so don’t stop moving.  Bring plenty of water. Don’t take off your sandals and run through the sand dunes. Are you curious about this one?  I was.  Apparently some geniuses went to the sand dunes (amazing, by the way) early in the day before it was really hot and sunny.  They took of their shoes and ran (creative license on this part, I’m not sure if they walked, ran, or cartwheeled) across the sand to the far side.  Well, the sand heats up pretty quickly, and they were kind of trapped there with no shoes. They needed to cross the sand dunes (shoeless) to get back.  Which caused 3rd degree burns on their feet, and they had to somehow be rescued.  They lost their Mensa memberships. All this was told to scare us into keeping our shoes on while walking on the sand dunes.  It worked. By the time we got to the dunes they were already about a million degrees.  I think my flip flops melted.  It was worth it.

In some strange way, Death Valley was my favorite.  It was eerie and alien-ly beautiful.  The colors. Oh, the colors. Green, black, pink, orange sand/rocks. I’m not a scientist so don’t hold me to the part about it being sand/rocks, but it was gorgeous.  Probably minerals or something.  We did the Borax.

We were able to get out of the car at the best scenic vantage points (like Dante’s View and Zabriskie Point) to take in the otherworldly views. Again, HOT, but so worth it. I feel like I also need to say that I like being hot way more than I like being cold. I’d rather be in Death Valley in July than go skiing at any point in time.

The advantages to going to Death Valley in July were:

1. No crowds
2. It was cheaper than a trip to Europe with the same demographic

We were among the only crazy people there, and of those of us who braved the heat, we were the only English speakers.  It was very interesting to be in the USA and literally hear NO ONE speaking English (except for the Park Rangers, that is).  It seemed like most people were speaking French.  This was a bonus, as I miss Europe & it made me feel nostalgic.  I appreciate that others appreciate our country.  I (most likely, since I’m not 100% sure where most of these people were from ) appreciate their countries too, so its a win-win.  And I’m pretty sure that they weren’t Americans for whom English is not a first language.  I could always be wrong about that, but there was definitely a European vibe going on. This was true in every single National Park we visited on that trip, but Death Valley was the only one that was 100% in the non-English speaking category. Fascinating…

So, would we visit Death Valley in July again? In a heartbeat. With lots of water, sturdy shoes and a French/English dictionary.