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brianinca

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We ran up from San Diego to Ridgecrest on Sunday after two days at a Coronado hotel. Ducked into Red Rock Canyon on the way, that's a cool little State park! There are lots and lots of trails across the highway from the amazing rocks, worth a visit by itself. Next day we went up the West side to visit Fossil Falls, which is the eeriest looking rock formations I ever recall seeing.

We were there to see the amazing geology and stopped pretty much any time one of us said "Ooooooh!" - which happened a LOT! Rainbow Canyon got a call out from both of us.
Jeep Gladiator Death Valley in Winter is amazing! RainbowCanyon2


Ironically, it's SO huge and SO colorful, I never connected "Starwars Canyon" and "Jedi Transition" to this place. I've seen the videos and pictures of the jets, but it's unrecognize-able when you see it in person. A nice fellow with a Taco named Mark came over to ask about the JTR, he filled us in on that and Titus Canyon. We'd had the latter on our maybe list, he strongly suggested moving it to MUST GO. Good guy!

Jeep Gladiator Death Valley in Winter is amazing! PXL_20210104_231202658

The Park Police in DV drive JLUR's, which makes a LOT of sense! Stayed in Beatty for the night, wasn't bad at all.

Next day we headed to Ubehebe Crater via Titus Canyon and it was AMAZING! 5-6 miles of graded road at 40-50 MPH, probably could have done 70 in a Mojave but we made good time. Road got windy and rougher so we aired down to 18.5 PSI (Speedflate is GOOD). The entrance geology was SO COOL but little did we know....

Jeep Gladiator Death Valley in Winter is amazing! PXL_20210105_183528951
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brianinca

brianinca

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The up close and personal nature of the HUGELY varied geology was just incredible! My wife has a Geology minor and called out the fault evidence as we passed it, she was so excited she hurt her neck looking up at everything. If it hadn't been so dang cold we would have taken the tops off but there was week old snow on the ground for a reason.

Jeep Gladiator Death Valley in Winter is amazing! PXL_20210105_210231930


Pictures never show how steep it is or how pretty things are, but the winding path through the river gorge was a sight to behold.

Jeep Gladiator Death Valley in Winter is amazing! PXL_20210105_211601445


Did I mention Speedflate is good?

Jeep Gladiator Death Valley in Winter is amazing! PXL_20210105_214407157


Back up to 35 PSI in about ten minutes, no muss no fuss.
 
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brianinca

brianinca

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Ubehebe Crater is crazy, 2000 years ago it blew its top and dumped ejecta 6 miles around the crater. Still 500' deep and a half-mile across. Did I mention I don't like heights?

Jeep Gladiator Death Valley in Winter is amazing! PXL_20210105_222146562


Anyway, that's what I've got from DV, Trona Pinnacles is definitely worth a visit if any of you are up that way. My Wife took all the pictures, she joked she was going to run out of film.

We won't make it for the flowers this Spring, I got to see them 20 years ago, we'll go back in 2022 for that show of Nature!
 

Wicknalter

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Wow that looks like a good time. Curious what compressor set up your running. Looking to add one very soon​
 
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brianinca

brianinca

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It's the Smittybilt 2781 that has a made up CFM rating, but it works REALLY well. A ten minute start-to-finish air-up doesn't get close to the 40 minute duty cycle. The higher volume seems to match well to the Speedflate distribution system.

The quick connect is NOT the US standard, it's a Japanese style that's really quite nice. I made up a coiled hose with the Japanese connector on one end and a standard US connector on the other, no big deal.

Wow that looks like a good time. Curious what compressor set up your running. Looking to add one very soon​
 

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We were there 2 weeks ago from Trona Pinnacles, Death Valley and did the Titus Cyn. coming from Beatty NV as its a one way trail. Took us couple of hours just stopping and enjoying the view. Interesting as within 4 hrs. completing the trail, we have not seen anyone. It was also a Sunday, but sand dunes and other tourist attractions were packed.

04F0D848-35FE-41C7-8E72-D4A13451B76D.jpeg
 
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brianinca

brianinca

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Did you get a chance to see Rhyolite on the way to the Titus Canyon entrance? OnX shows some interesting roads going out of there. We toured the town quickly but passed on the trails due to time, but we liked Beatty and the El Portal motel well enough that we're already planning on the next trip. We skipped Racetrack and a bunch of other stuff, to. Lots of reasons to come back.

On Titus we saw four other vehicles in four hours, one a big Mercedes RV (big for the road). I think the snow/ice made them nervous, they only stopped at Leadville and were well and out of the canyon by the time we popped out.

Looks like a really fun group to travel with! I'm trying to talk my Jeep buddies from work into another trip to Mojave, maybe I'll start in on them about DV too.

We were there 2 weeks ago from Trona Pinnacles, Death Valley and did the Titus Cyn. coming from Beatty NV as its a one way trail. Took us couple of hours just stopping and enjoying the view. Interesting as within 4 hrs. completing the trail, we have not seen anyone. It was also a Sunday, but sand dunes and other tourist attractions were packed.

Jeep Gladiator Death Valley in Winter is amazing! 04F0D848-35FE-41C7-8E72-D4A13451B76D
 

DeezJT

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Directions to get there @brianinca? I was up in Stoddard Mountain Rd this past weekend... it shouldn't be too far away. I'd rather do it now when the weather is good than during the summer.
 
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brianinca

brianinca

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We came in from Beatty, but you can just wing up out of DV on 374 and pick up the road to Titus Canyon short of there.

https://www.nps.gov/deva/planyourvisit/titus-canyon.htm

One way is a big deal.

Here's Leadfield on Google Maps: https://goo.gl/maps/qHNu6hKqFDCQwobY9

Have fun!

Directions to get there @brianinca? I was up in Stoddard Mountain Rd this past weekend... it shouldn't be too far away. I'd rather do it now when the weather is good than during the summer.
 
 



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