Zabriskie Point

 

On our final hiking day, we drove up to Zabriskie Point on the east side of Death Valley. 

Manly Beacon is the pointy hill that is featured on many publicity photographs and tourist items here.

From there, we started a top to bottom hike down the Gower Gulch trail and through the badlands.  It was basically easy, but with a few steep places where we assisted each other going down.

At the end of this trail, the path skirts around a very steep and deep canyon carved by water runoff.  Great care was taken there so as not to fall over the edge! 

After lunch, we visited the remains of the Harmony Borax Works where the borax that was mined in the valley was processed and then loaded onto the containers that were pulled by the 20 Mule Team for the arduous journey to the rail head in Mojave California.  As a kid, I certainly remember 20 Mule Team Borax as a laundry additive.  BTW—there were actually 18 mules and 2 horses that pulled the containers. 

So that’s it for the trip.  The next day we were taken back to Las Vegas, and I drove on to Cedar City, where it was pouring rain when I arrived!  It was so nice to get out of the winter weather and into a dry and sunny location for a week.