I stopped at Needles in mid-afternoon – it is just too hot to keep going during the day, so I’m switching to night driving for a while. Of course, that means I’ll probably get rained on in the dark…

I left I-40 at Ludlow and headed onto Route 66:

About 10 miles down the road from Ludlow, I came upon a classic MG sitting on the side of the road with its hood up. My family had one of these in the 60’s, and it is a tradition to stop and swap war stories (and parts!) when you see one. I offered the driver some water and we chatted for a bit. His name was Jason and he was driving all of the still-existing parts of Route 66, starting in Chicago. You can’t make it out in the picture, but that’s a Chicago British Car Union badge on the car’s grille. He was just letting the car cool down, as cars of that era tend to run a bit hot (particularly when exported from the cooler British climate to the US):

After chatting a while, we both motored on down the road in our separate directions, and I arrived at Roy’s in Amboy. I was amazed to see that it was actually open and selling gas, soda, souvenirs and so on – all at very reasonable prices:

The last time I came through (in 2004) the whole town had a “For Sale” sign on it:

I chatted with the folks running the store for a bit – apparently they’re planning on re-opening the motel / cabins in the future. The biggest issue seems to be that they don’t have any sort of septic / sewer system at the moment. While I was in there, nearly a dozen separate batches of visitors came in and went out – it is becoming quite a popular spot (well, for the middle of nowhere) again.

One parting picture and I was on the road again, heading East:

I drove from Death Valley to Barstow today. With temperatures well over 100 forecast for the next few days, I’m not going to be able to make the distances I’d planned on each day.

Monday I’m going to drive through Amboy and try to get some pictures of the Atom at that famous sign.

After that, I may change course and head toward home via a more northerly route to try to get out of the heat. Rain is also forecast for parts of Arizona and New Mexico, so I may have to sit that out, too. I won’t need to make a final decision on changing my route until I get to Albuquerque, so stay tuned.

This morning I headed out around 8:30 AM. I wanted to visit Ubehebe Crater, but by the time I got to Stovepipe Wells (about halfway) it was too hot for both me and the Atom. The Atom oil temperature hit 226 on some of the uphill pulls.

So I turned around at Stovepipe Wells and headed back to the Panamint Springs Resort where I’m staying. My room is a “comfortable” 97 degrees.

I’ll head out around 5 in the morning when the outside temperature should be down to the mid-90’s.

According to the National Weather Service, we’re having a heat wave:

Excessive Heat Warning
Statement as of 4:45 AM MDT on July 17, 2010

* Greatest impact areas: the hottest temperatures will occur
within the Colorado River valley and Death Valley National
Park. Plan any outdoor activities in the early morning or in
the evening after sunset.

Update: There were still temporary signs saying “Caution – runners on road”, as the Badwater Ultramarathon just wrapped up a couple of days ago. Out of 80 entrants, only 7 did not complete the 135-mile course. That is amazing!

Update 2: Here’s one picture from a run down the valley I did at sunset:

Update 3: After Panamint closed for the night, I gave the guy that was running the general store a ride down the valley and back after dark. He thought the Atom was a blast! There’s a very funny story about this ride – I asked the guy if he had a helmet, and he said “of course”. So, after he closed the general store he went back to his trailer to get it. After quite a while, he comes back and says “I couldn’t find it, but a friend gave me this thing as a gag gift. I’ll use that.” The “thing” in question was an old-style gas mask, with the accordion hose and canaster that hangs down like an elephant’s trunk. It is a good thing it was dark and the road was deserted – anyone seeing us would have died of laughter! The bright spot near the top left in the first video is the moon.

Now that a nice long time has passed, I’m making the following 2 videos public (they had been marked private before).

Rollbar camera video:

Nose camera video:

(The above videos are the full 480i versions. Click the icon on the top right to go fullscreen.)

I’m in Death Valley (at the Panamint Springs Resort) tonight and tomorrow night.

Let’s just say that driving here was intense – I must have gone through several gallons of water and a gallon of Gatorade. Today’s high here was 125 according to the park report.

Even outside the park, it was incredibly hot. At the point where the Path 65 DC transmission line crosses Highway 58, there was so much sag in the line from the heat that it looked like it was only about 50 feet above the road. Given that this line carries 3.1 gigawatts at 500KV, that’s pretty close.

The folks at Panamint Springs are still nice and friendly, as they were when they got the place just before I came through with the Atom in 2006 (before that, the place was run by seriously grumpy people).

Unfortunately, between 2006 and now they gave away The World’s Laziest Cat. I’m sure the cat likes it wherever it is now – it has to be cooler than here. Here’s a picture of TWLC from 2006:

I’ll probably just hang out at the resort and do a few runs in the Atom tomorrow – it is too hot for extended drives (I’ll leave at night when it is cooler).

I had two goals for today – to climb to the top of Moro Rock and to not be chased by a bear in Crescent Meadow. I had a 50% success rate:

Moro Rock: This large rock is one of the more prominent geological features in the park. As some of you may know, I have a very specific type of “fear of heights” – fear of losing my balance and falling. That’s because I do lose my balance easily – I’ve been known to look up to photograph a sequoia and fall over backwards. Anyway, in 2004 I made it about halfway up the rock before I chickened out and gave up. I set a goal for myself of making it to the top this time. Unfortunately, a combination of things – wearing driving shoes with slippery soles on loose sand on the rock, about 50 more pounds on me than in 2004, and the previously mentioned fear of heights led me to turn back about 75′ (vertical) from the top of the rock.

Not getting chased by a bear in Crescent Meadow: While this may sound like an odd goal, also in 2004, I was hiking on the High Sierra Trail in Crescent Meadow when I met a bear:

(I tell people the bear was blurry because he was nervous).

Anyway, the goal today was to not meet another bear. I succeeded – no bears in sight.

I then decided to visit Crystal Cave. The second half of the road to the cave is not recommended for Atoms. After you get to the parking lot at the end of the road, there is a 1/2 mile hike down to the cave. Going down wasn’t bad – getting back to the top was, shall we say, “challenging”. They do have a sign that says “not recommended for people in poor physical condition”. I have discovered that I qualify.

After I got back to the parking area and drove back down the access road, it rained briefly. One of the things you notice in an Atom that you don’t get in a regular car is the scents. Sometimes (like when driving by a cattle feedlot) that’s not good. Other times (like Sequoia after the rain) it is fantastic. They should bottle that smell and sell it. The closest I’ve ever come to this smell back home is Cedar Pond, one of the mostly off-limit areas of the Clinton Reservoir watershed.

Pictures coming when I get a faster Internet connection.

Update – a whole bunch of pictures:

Near the top of Moro Rock:

That zigzag on the top is the road:

The railing in the center of the picture is as far as I made it up the rock:

The Forest Service was doing a “controlled burn” to clear debris on the ground. They had finished the area by Crescent Meadow, but the drive to there involved going through some pretty heavy smoke. By the way, this is the kind of picture where I fall over when taking it:

Here’s what the woods in the back of Crescent Meadow look like after the burn:

A hand-held shot of some of the formations in Crystal Cave. That’s my flashlight beam lighting up the center. I have some practice (scroll about halfway down the page) doing this:

Fat people need not apply (that’s me!):

This park couldn’t be more different from Yosemite – the ranger at the gate was very friendly and just asked me if I wanted a map and newspaper (since I now have the annual pass on the car, they assume I might be a regular). He informed me of all of the road construction and when the best times to avoid delays were.

The road construction I encountered was very professionally managed, with one lane of paved road alternating directions every hour.

I feel sorry for the ranger that has to walk to all of the waiting cars and tell them when the road is re-opening. She had to walk a couple miles down the road (with the accompanying 1000+ feet of elevation change) and then back up. I told her they should get her a Segway. She has to do this 4 times a day.

I’m in the woods with a slow Internet connection – I may post some pictures later if it speeds up.

Update: Pictures, as promised…

A very lazy deer – it was walking along the paved path until I came along – then it went over the fence back into the woods:

The obligatory picture of the General Grant Tree:

My Atom overlooking Kings Canyon:

I’m in Yosemite again today. Despite the stupidity with the roads (see the previous post), I managed to get some good driving done.

First, in Yosemite Valley:

Upper Yosemite Falls:

El Capitan:

I then drove up to Glacier Point and hiked to the Point from the parking lot:

Half Dome and Falls:

The Ahwahnee:

This picture shows the hotel I’m staying at in Yosemite Valley. In the first one of yesterday’s 3 pictures from the hotel balcony you can see the view from the hotel looking up to this point.

Although the hotel and Glacier Point are only about a mile apart, the road snakes through the hills for 32 miles because of the elevation changes. Glacier Point is not the highest point on the road – that’s somewhere around Mono Meadow (I wonder if there’s a Stereo Meadow or a Surround Meadow). At the highest elevations there are still patches of snow in the shady areas along the side of the road.

Tomorrow I’m on to Sequoia / Kings Canyon which should be a lot less crowded.

I didn’t think it was possible for the park staff to top yesterday’s bountiful supply of stupidity, but they exceeded my expectations by a wide margin…

The park newspaper noted that there were 30- to 60-minute delays on Wawona Road (the road south through the park). I’ve dealt with national park road construction before, and it is generally performed in a reasonably intelligent manner. Apparently the Yosemite folks are learning (or not) as they go along.

The main thing that is going on seems to be the installation of 6″ curbs at the side of the road in some points, for some unknown reason. However, to accomplish this, they have actually removed parts of the road, ranging from 10 yards to about 500 yards, and replaced it with a rutted dirt road.

They have one lane closed in a number of places, with flaggers at both ends to control traffic flow. This works so poorly that the trucks that are delivering the concrete for the curbs have to stop, put out a tarp on the side of the road, and dump the whole load of concrete because it is hardening before they get to where they’re supposed to deliver it. So there are large piles of concrete in a lot of the pull-over spots.

Once I got past the intermittent construction, I came to a place where they had removed about 10 miles of the road (again, for no apparent reason) and replaced it with a dirt road. In many spots it appeared that they actually placed the dirt on top of the paved road.

Why they’re doing this work at the peak of the tourist season escapes me…

Someone really needs to start hitting everyone involved hard with a clue-by-four.

Once I got past the cretins at the gate (see my previous post), I drove into the park and took a couple pictures along the way:

Half Dome:

Bridalveil Fall:

I checked into my suite at The Ahwahnee and went downstairs for dinner. When I came back to my room, I took these pictures from my private balcony, one from each direction:

The people manning the entry point and ranger station at the highway 120 entry point to Yosemite have to be some of the dumbest specimens of humanity I’ve ever encountered.

I pre-purchased an annual National Parks Pass specifically to avoid some of these hassles. It took me about 20 minutes to make it to the head of the line, which I initially thought was because of the visitors, not the staff. Boy, was I wrong…

When I made it to the head of the line, I handed in my pass and said “I need a window decal because this is an open car” (the literature I got with the pass said that window decals are available for convertibles, motorcycles, etc. because the standard procedure is to hang the annual pass from the rear-view mirror, where anyone could just take it).

They acted like they’d never seen an annual pass before, and then proceeded to have a 10-minute debate, involving 2 additional employees and a phone conversation. They then asked to see my car’s registration, which I handed over. Despite having a huge “05/2011” expiration date on it, they proceeded to tell me it was expired. After another 5 minutes, additional employee, and another phone call, I got my registration and annual pass back and was handed the window decal and park newspaper / map.

Rather than blocking the entry gate, I pulled into the ranger station / visitor center so I could put all my paperwork away.

By this time I was incredibly hot and thirsty. There was a water vending machine there (while I had water in the car, it was hot and I wanted a cold one). It was sold out of all water. There was also a soda machine which had a dollar bill slot that wouldn’t take any of the 6 bills I tried.

I went into the information center / ranger station and explained (after waiting on line, again) that both vending machines were broken, and asked if I could swap 2 $1 bills for 8 quarters from their tip jar. They refused. They then told me that the next water was 6 miles down the road at Crane Flat, and that I could complain about the broken vending machines there.

As I slowly made my way out of the information center and back to the Atom, I discovered that there was a working drinking fountain around the side of the building.

Idiots.

I reserve a special spot in hell for fools like these.