Death Valley
National Park
Is Not Dead BY DENNIS BEGIN
T e name Death Valley is synonymous with DEATH, rather a foreboding topic.
As my wife Patricia and I approached Furnace Creek Ranch, the heart of Death
Valley, we were a little apprehensive. My fi rst memory of Death Valley is based on early black and white western movies featuring Roy Rogers, Gene Autry or John Wayne. Yes, that really dates me!! T e local Timbisha Shoshone Indians called their valley ‘Tumpisa’, meaning ‘rock paint’, coming from the red ochre paint they made from clay. When gold was discovered in California in 1849, prospectors attempted to take a short cut through the valley but never found their way out. Aſt er being rescued and on leaving the valley, a prospector looked back and said, “Goodbye, Death Valley”... and the name stuck. William Manly, one of the original prospectors recorded that, “it was the most God-forsaken country in the world ... this was the
Creator’s dumping ground where he had leſt the worthless dregs aſt er making the world”. T is statement seems a little harsh!! Death Valley is a geological
phenomenon. Located west of Las Vegas along the California-Nevada border, the valley is approximately 45 x 140 miles (71 x 225 km). Almost all of the national park is between California’s Mojave Desert in the south and the Great Basin in the north. T e valley is surrounded by fi ve mountain ranges, with the Amargosa Mountains to the east and the Panamint Mountains to the west making up the bulk of the mountains. Between fi ve and 30 million years ago, the valley was created by the folding and faulting of the earth’s crust, creating extremes of high mountains (Mt. Telescope at 11,049 feet) and a deep valley below sea level. So what does Death Valley off er
RV’ers? Death Valley became a National Monument in 1933 and a National Park in 1994. Stop fi rst at the National Park Visitor Center. T ere are hundreds of camping sites but in the three major resorts of Stovepipe Wells, Furnace
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