Trip to Death Valley

My fascination for wanderness has been ever increasing since my last 2 trips to Grand Canyon and then Sequoiah National park. Following the trend, I with a old friend from IIT, my office mate and his girlfriend, went on a road trip to Death Valley national park this weekend. Had heard a lot about the barreness of the place and how harsh the climate there gets. Temperatures in summer go as high as 120 F, and during the nights too, temperatures hover around 100-110 F. We were prepared well for the trip except for the unexpected. Our journey started from San Diego on 15N. At Bakers a
small, town along the way, we bifurcated on to highway 127 W, with the intentions of entering the park from north east, on highway 190. But it turned out that the highway was closed. and the reason for it being closed, guess what Flash Floods....yes Floods..
Wonder how coud that happen in such a place which is extremely dry and barren and for sure tjere is no trace of a drop of water or any greenary for miles and milses. But, as u can read at the following news report, and well described by the forest ranger in the death valley, Death valley is far from dead and is dynamically alive and it kicks ass!!!
Flash Flood in Death Valley
Our entry into the park was delayed by an hour and half as we had to move on furthur, north and we entered the park from Beatty, as small ghost town 8 miles east of Death valley.
As expected the temperatures were well in to 100s, by the time we reached Furnace Creek, the main camping point in the valley. We figured out there that the park was organising short car trips to flash flood zone, in the valley to show us the extensive damage done by the floods.. It was rare ocassion for us to see first hand the vagaries of nature and how helpless us human beings can be some times..

We moved on from there, driving west on 190, as from the Furnace Creek Ranch, 190 furthur towards east was closed, and we were told that it will remain so for atleast a couple of months.
By the time we left the Ranch, it was around 5.30 pm, and for sure it was still complete daylight and still temperature being close to around 115 F. We next decided to move on to a nice Hiking place called Mossaic Canyon, near Stovepipe wells, around 35 miles west on 190.

On our way there, I had first glimpse of real san dunes, read a lot about in highschool Geography class. They are pristine pure, simply awesome. Our hiking plans changed, we decided to explore the sand dunes instead.

For there we moved on and found a camping spot close to exit to Wildrose, near stovepipe wells. We had company there..a couple from some european country I guess.
Camped there, celebrated my old friends birthday which as it turns out was on the same day.

Simply awesome trip overall...