Liftoff
Well, we made it back from our marathon trip to pick up the Sportsmobile. It was a lot of driving over 5 days and we were so worn out by the time we picked up the Rig we didn’t really do any photography (well, the horde of people on the sand dunes had a bit to do with it as well, to include that fellow on the top of the tallest dune . . . made me wish I had a sniper’s rifle).
But just because we didn’t really go photographing doesn’t mean we don’t have photos. We always have our iPhones and, well, just think of these images as baby pictures taken by new parents.
The trip down was fairly uneventful, but wet. It seemed like Oregon’s spring rains followed us al the way down to Fresno. By the looks of the reservoirs we drove by, which were nearly dry the last time we passed by, California has received plenty of rain. They have a great snowpack, so hopefully the ground water levels improve as quickly as surface water levels.
Although we tried to take our time getting to Sportsmobile West on Thursday morning, we still wound up arriving there half an hour early. To our surprise, they announced to the world that we were coming!
And that smile you see on Ann's face? Well, she had it on all day!
We promptly walked through the office and into the warehouse to find our sports mobile waiting for us!
It didn’t take them long before different folks came by to explain where everything was and how everything worked - from the interior/exterior electronics, to the details of vehicle maintenance, to how to operate the power inverter, heating, hot water, etc.
Time flew by! At one point I glanced down at my watch and it was already 2:30 pm. Six hours non-stop of trying to suck in as much information as our brains could hold!
Soon enough we were done and took off towards Las Vegas, spending the night in Barstow.
The handoff went smoothly the next day. We met at a UPS store, had the transfer notarized, I then dropped the driver off at the airport and then we headed over to the car rental office to drop off the rental. We walked out of the rental complex, ready to start our ride home.
Back in the early ’90’s, before I headed out west, I spent some time shacking out on my friends Ryan and Erika’s couch while doing some photography work in Blacksburg. One day, a couple of guys brought over a brand new butcher block table top - the largest I’ve ever seen, it must have been 4’ x 6’ or better (Bernie would call it “Huge!”) - and set it down on their kitchen island. As soon as the guys left Ryan walked over to a drawer, pulled out a meat cleaver and not so gently chopped it into the block, knife sticking out on its own. I almost died, “Ryan! Are you nuts?” His response, “Look, it’s going to happen some time, and we’re planning on using it as a chopping block anyway, so I might as well get that first big gouge out of the way now and not worry about it happening later.” He had a point.
So following that lesson, we decided that we were going to take a back road into Death Valley that I’d always wanted to take ever since I first heard of it. Titus Canyon Road - a one-way track that goes from East to West. For some (like Jonathan’s dad at Sportsmobile), it’s not a “real” 4x4 road. However, it is off road and, despite what Jonathan’s dad said, we needed the 4 wheel drive at a few points during the climb up. And yes, those of you who know about Ann’s dislike of heights, we did go up. I swear that every video I saw of it showed a fairly flat route. Well, I guess folks don’t like taking video on the switchbacks up, or down for that matter. Still, Ann braved through it and even enjoyed much of the scenery.
Once we got to the top, it was time to stop and enjoy the view:
And as you can tell, it’s starting to get dirty, less than three hours after we took possession! It was only going to get worse, or should I say, better, because there was definitely more to come.
We drove another half mile or so, past that hill to the left, and it opened onto a view of a lovely valley.
It was fun driving through an area where the road led off to a bend in the distance and you had no idea of what would follow.
A bit later and the descent began, which then wrapped around a bend to show the route of our descent
While it may not look very steep, it was and some of the route had rocky ledges that had to be taken carefully. It’s impressive how noble this not so little vehicle is. Eventually we made it down to fairly level ground, and then entered Titus Canyon proper.
And some of the bends weren’t much wider than the Rig.
We would drive a bit, then stop again just to enjoy the reflected light that bounced down into the canyon.
It truly was an incredible place.
We’ve decided that on our next trip back to Death Valley, this is a must photograph route!
That night we spent our first night in the Sportsmobile at Stovepipe wells. The evening was spent unpacking the boxes we’d brought things down in (hurriedly moved from the rental car into the Rig), dropped the bed from the pop-top and had a great night’s sleep (well, except for the drunk guys walking around at 3:00 am).
We learned that getting up and ready in the morning isn’t going to be as quick as we’d thought, at least until we get a routine down and figure out how to operate everything. As it is, we drove down to the Mesquite Sand Dunes just as the sun was rising, saw the above-mentioned hordes and decided that photographing just wasn’t the thing to do. I guess we might as well pull things out, brew up some coffee and enjoy the scenery. So we did.
We decided that we were pretty exhausted from our trip down, the long day at Sportsmobile West and the excitement of finally getting the vehicle we’d been waiting almost 17 months for, so we decided to try to be efficient about heading home and not following our original planned route which would have allowed for some photography, but would have meant a much longer drive back home on Sunday. Instead, we headed west towards Lone Pine for an amazing breakfast at the Alabama Hills Cafe.
Amazingly, the next morning we did breakfast at Cinders Cafe by the Klamath National Wildlife Refuge. Bet you can’t guess what our favorite meal of the day is . . . .
The drive was beautiful, it was good to test the Rig out a bit, and a rather pleasant way of letting us know we’ve got a lot of figuring out to do if we’re going to be living out of this thing for three weeks in May!
Anyway, the Adventure Begins!
In case anyone wants to know the route we took, here’s a map from our inReach satellite receiver. This was a practice run for more than just the Sportsmobile!
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