Cold, rainy, & windy. We were in... (BW Warning)

[rgG]

DEATH VALLEY!!!

I kid you not. We were in Las Vegas last week for a wedding and took a couple of days to go over to Death Valley on Sunday. It rained on us most of the way there, but thankfully cleared up for a while after we arrived, but it was still super windy and not very warm.

On Monday, it was drizzling, overcast and super windy. We hiked anyway, but I though the hat I brought would be to keep the sun out of my eyes and not the rain off my glasses. LOL

Here are a few pics, and they are not the typical Death Valley pics you would think.

All pics were taken with my 6+ as I was not going to carry around a camera. All are just as they came out of the camera. I haven't had time to touch them up, yet.

My daughter and her BF were with us and he is a professional photographer and colorist, so he was in charge of taking us some "good" pics that I will get later.



Sand Dunes near Stovepipe Wells, where we were staying. This was just about sunset. We went out here for some stargazing later that night. Luckily, the sky was pretty clear and we could see a LOT of stars and the Milky Way.



This is a picture of the "superbloom" you might have heard about. There are just thousands of little yellow flowers blooming all over what would normally be desert sand. These had shot up pretty good, as it was a little past the peak, I think. Hard to get a good shot, but you can see that it is just a sea of yellow.



Here is a close up of the little yellow flowers. Hard to get a good pic, as it was crazy windy.



Creek, yes creek, leading up to the famous salt flats that you can walk out on. Wasn't expecting a creek here. LOL.



Here is the view from Dante's View looking down onto the salt flats from the last pic. That white stuff is salt, not water.



Dark purple flowers that were also blooming.



Here is a different little yellow flower with the purple one.



Light pink flower



Here is one I like to call Trump's Hair. I think it might be a parasitic plant that attaches to that green bush below, but not sure. Named seemed appropriate, either way.
The sign in the background is the entrance to Death Valley from CA 190



This is along the Artist View drive.



This is further along Artist View drive. It was gorgeous, even if it was super overcast, as you can see in the pic.



This is Mosaic Canyon. You can see that the ground is damp, from the drizzling rain we had just had. So weird.

[bazookaman]

rgG wrote:
This is Mosaic Canyon. You can see that the ground is damp, from the drizzling rain we had just had. So weird.

Looks like R2D2 should be rolling around the corner.

[rgG]

bazookaman wrote:
[quote=rgG]
This is Mosaic Canyon. You can see that the ground is damp, from the drizzling rain we had just had. So weird.

Looks like R2D2 should be rolling around the corner.
Yep, they had movie posters of some of the films that had been shot in DV and Star Wars was on the wall, along with a couple of the sequels.

[rgG]

That weird orange plant is a parasite.

Cuscuta californica is a parasitic vine which climbs other plants and takes nutrition directly from them via a haustorium. The dodder resembles a pile of yellow-orange straw wrapped tightly around its host plant. It is mostly stem; the leaves are reduced to scales on the stem's surface, since they are not needed for photosynthesis while the dodder is obtaining nutrients from its host. It bears tiny white flowers which are only about 3 millimeters wide, and fruits which are even smaller.

Still think Trump's Hair should be the common name.

[rgG]

Here is one more. This plant looks like it has green ribbon roses or something. I have never seen anything like it. From what I can find, it looks like it is called a Desert Holly.

[davester]

Very nice pics. You were lucky it was only raining. I've been out there in March when it was blizzarding. Don't you remember my advice earlier..."The desert can be extremely cold in winter or early spring. Take warm clothes, and water, and food."

[archipirata]

Nice photos. Dynamic range in those iPhone images is better than a lot of DSLRs I've used.

[Article Accelerator]

Great photos, rgG!

[Pat]

Glad you got out to DV. Nice pics.
Rain brings out a lot of colors/depth that just isn't there in the full glare of the sun.

[DP]

Way cool, Rhonnie! All the time I spent in CA and have yet to make it to DV.
I'll have to dig them out but I have a similar shot from Australia in an area near Alice Springs called Rainbow Valley. When we got there, everyone said, "Isn't it beautiful here? We just got our first rain in two years and everything is so green!"... Well, it wasn't green like I'm accustomed to, but they did have dry areas that were all of a sudden covered with flowers from the rain.