Our November 2009 Death Valley Geology Tour was a great trip- a huge thank you again to Allan Shareghi, senior geologist, for enlightening us on Death Valley’s remarkable geology, and thanks to everyone who came along- you all may it hugely enjoyable and worth the effort.
The trip started out with everybody meeting at the gas station in Pearsonville. We had a great representation of eleven trucks- a D90, several Discos, several LR3s, a couple of RR Classics, a P38, and a supercharged Range Rover.
Our first stop was at Fossil Falls, just about 15 miles north of Pearsonville. We all hiked the .7 mile trek to view the wonderfully carved and polished basaltic rock. The Coso Range is a good representation of several basaltic flows over the eons.
We headed to the Olancha Ranch Café for breakfast, only to find out that breakfast ends promptly at 11 am- we were there at 11:10. No cajoling or pleading could convince them to serve breakfast, so a word of warning to you.
After lunch at Olancha, we headed east on the 190, then north on the 136 to the trailhead at Swansea. We stopped there to air down, and while there, a couple of very friendly park rangers came to talk with us and to meet Allan. They wished us a great trip and off we headed up the Swansea grade. They also asked us to let them know if we came across anything they should know about- rock slides, washouts, downed trees, etc. to post that news to alert the next group(s) to come through.
The Swansea grade climbs fairly quickly with just a couple of “technical” spots that everyone got through without trouble, or at least it seemed. John Short, in his RR Classic, apparently had some kind of gremlin crawl under the hood shortly after getting through the short technical section- his truck just died. After a little investigation under the hood, he discovered that the coil wire had come loose (how does that happen?- gremlins!). John re-attached the coil wire and off we went. We stopped a little further up the trail at a great view point looking west over the Owens Valley towards the Sierra and Mt. Whitney, and for a short geology lesson from Allan.
A couple miles further up the trail, Yubert and Colen, in their Disco, started experiencing a strange noise coming from the front end of their truck. Several of us tried to diagnose the problem- maybe the Traction Control was messed up- the indicator light was on- and it sounded like the brakes just wouldn’t let go. So we popped the hood, and disconnected the battery hoping that by resetting the computer, we would fix the problem. That didn’t work, so next we pulled off the left front wheel (where we kind of thought the problem was), but we didn’t find anything there. We thought that maybe something (a rock) was stuck between the caliper and brake disc, and was causing the problem, but no joy there.
We put the wheel back on, and now that noise was gone- maybe we fixed it. Short-lived optimism- right away Yubert drove a short distance and felt a vibration coming from under the car. Eric crawled under the car with a flashlight and decided that the transfer case mount was shot. I knew that continuing was out of the question for Yubert (there were still some challenging sections to come), so we decided it would be best for him to head back down the Swansea Grade and drive into Lone Pine for repairs.
Hans in his D90 and Eduardo and Guinevere (Hans’ daughter) in their Disco would go with Yubert to make sure he made it back to the highway, and would meet us at Panamint Springs Resort. The rest of us continued up the Swansea Grade, heading toward the Salt Tram. We would pass on visiting Burgess Mine- we were a little behind schedule with the attempted repairs on Yubert’s truck.
We got to the Salt Tram just as the sun was setting, at around 4:30. (Darn if the sun doesn’t set so early!) The temperature was about 34 degrees and the winds around 40-50 knots so we didn’t spend more than about 10 minutes before we dashed backed into the cars and headed toward Cerro Gordo. We really didn’t get a chance to see the wonderful work the BLM has done sprucing up the place. Oh well, I’ll guess we’ll just have to go again in the spring when the sun stays up longer.
The single-track road to Cerro Gordo does cause the cars to lean a little, and there are a few pucker factor places that always add to the excitement. The brush was encroaching as well, though it seemed that someone had done a little “gardening” lately.
Of course it was pitch black by the time we arrived at Cerro Gordo and rather than drive through Lee Flat to get to Panamint Springs (a lot longer drive without the opportunity to see anything in the dark), we decided to head down Cerro Gordo Road and pick up the 190 Highway.
Once on the 190, Jack and Jeff in their LR3 headed home, while the rest of us made our way to spend the night in Panamint Springs.
Several of us camped- the rest stayed in the Resort. Dinner was tasty, the rooms warm, and we were ready for a good night’s rest.
More to come.
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Day 2 Report -----
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Day 3 Report -----
