If there was one place that needed a make over it is this visitor center all the exhibits look like they are straight out of the 1960s, there is even a slide show, where the color fade has rendered it almost completely useless. Death Valley is the biggest park excluding Alaska so driving around it takes time. And you do not want to hike the majority of the death due to the suffocating heat. So we did not get to see that much.
After the Visitor Center we saw Scotty's Castle, which was neat but we got there too late to go inside. This building was made during the 1920s by a wealthy investor who wanted a place to escape his troubles and his pack pain. His name was not Scotty, instead it was Johnson. John and Scotty were close friends. They met when Johnson first visited the desert and fell in love. There Johnson built an amazing house for him, his wife and Scotty. During the depression they opened it up as a place to stay and Scotty entertained the travelers with his tall tales. This continued even past Johnson's death. He left the house to a charitable organization he started that controlled the house and cared for Scotty. Scotty died in 1954 and was buried on a hill over looking the Castle. And Thus it was known as Scotty's Castle. Its very beautifully done in the vien of the Span ish missions, with bell towers, stucco and spanish shingles. There is tons of decorative titles all over the grounds which provide a nice colorful landscape to the same time dreary desert.
After that we headed back to the visitor center area to see Dante's View. This is 11,0000 feet up, (our highest point yet) and looks over all of Death Valley. Really gave us a great view of it all, and helped us settle our qualms of not seeing much. I enjoyed Death Valley as did Alie but i think we are a little burned out of the desert. We've driven through so much its become matter fact. Even though this desert is very unique, it still reminds of previous long hauls.
Getting to Vegas was easy, but we were arrived there were no rooms available in all of Vegas due to this huge Boxing match alie nor I had any idea about. All of Vegas book we got desperate, one of the resorts we called connected us to a hotel Booking Agency. We got a great room for a good price at a place called the Desert Paradise Resort. However when we arrived there the person at the desk had no information on us whatsoever. According to the agency she was going to send a fax, but according to the man at the disk there was nothing. So we were screwed, we tried a few more places and they were all booked solid.
I ended up calling my friend Will. He recently moved to Vegas and is currently on tour with Little Women, so his room was available. He was very generous in allowing Alie and I to stay and basically pulling our ass from the fire. I checked my credit card and the room hadn't posted yet so I'll have to wait to get the money back there. I might send an email to the booking agency, but I rather not deal with them or the Desert Paradise anymore and just block payment on my card. I'll let you know how this gets sorted out as well.
As for my power block. The hotel has it and I have to call tomorrow to arrange for shipments. But for now I must sleep since its been an excruciatingly long day full of fun, and frustration. I knew our luck was going too well on the return trip hopefully this will be the last for a while.
A few days late but there are here now:
Distance: 309.7mi
Overall avg: 36.3mph
Moving avg: 51.2mph
Total time: 8h 31m
Moving time: 6h 2m
Stopped: 2h 28m
Destination Tomorrow: The Strip and then Salt Lake since Jackson Hole is just a little too far.
