This was the biggest adventure of my life so far.

Friday, January 27th, 2012. I had been researching places to go 4WD camping for the whole week. Since the only real ‘wild’ areas I had been in California were in the Tahoe area, I started looking there. Blogs, forums and websites. With winter starting it was cold and the snow had come in. For Stanislaus and Eldorado National Forests, all off-road trails were closed. I had also been given the suggestion of going to Hollister. 1.5 hour drive. Not bad, but this is a ‘park’. There are lots of people. Drunk, loud, sometimes irritating people. Dirtbikes and quads everywhere. Hmm, doesnt sound like my forte. So now what? Look down southward and extend the trip to cover it. What’s this? Death Valley? I have heard of this place. It sounds…perfect. No rain or snow (for the most part), not too cold (more to come on this!), with many, many trails of all shapes and sizes. Let’s do it.

It’s at this point, early friday morning, that I decide I need (yes, I said need. lol) to put stronger front springs in the FJ. Riiiight. Hours before leaving. So I rent a spring compressor and get out the jack and tools. 2 hours later, with sore hands and knees, the car is back together with a much firmer, and slightly higher ride. Whew. That was worth it.

We scramble to pack the car, inside and out, and get on the road. 6pm launch time. Nice.

We head down I5 south (lovely ride btw, not) toward Bakersfield. As we get close to Bakersfield, we try to decide whether it would be better to sleep in Bakersfield, and leave 4 hours in the morning, or to continue on to Ridgecrest and leave 2 hours. We are both pretty tired by now, so we opt for Bakersfield.

5am rise. 6am launch.

On our way to Ridgecrest. 2 hour drive through Lake Isabella up hwy 178. This is a beautiful drive. The river that flows alongside 178 after Lake Isabella is gorgeous. I think this is the Inyokern river.

9am, we leave Ridgecrest to drive toward the south end of Death Valley. Our first target being Goler Canyon.

Here is the blurb from the Death Valley Roads map (I have put links to all maps and brochures below):

Goler Canyon Road continues west into Panamint Valley. Barker Ranch, hideout of the infamous Manson Family is up a short spur road. Vehicle needed: Rough 4WD. For experienced 4WD drivers only. Section over both sides of Mengel Pass is challenging, steep and rutted. Canyon narrows at west end is sometimes impassable after floods. Distance: 12 miles from pass to canyon mouth. Start: Mengel Pass. Camping: Allowed. Although mined for talc as recently as the early 1980s, Warm Springs Canyon is returning to nature.

Well, that sounds ‘challenging’. No restrictions on camping? Ok. The map shows it as being quite mountainous as well. Nice. My type of ride. Here is a closup of the topo from the map:

Goler Canyon Map

‘Road conditions require experienced 4-Wheel drivers’. Now that sounds fun!

At this point we setup the RAM windshield mount for my Kodak ZX-5 in order to record 720p 60 fps trail run videos. We also setup my RAM Apple iPad mount for my cupholder. I had downloaded a local version of the topo map for the Goler Pass area and was using MotionX GPS HD. This program rocks. I will do a separate post on this app and one on the Kodak ZX-5 soon.

So we’re off. We leave the main hwy, at the blue circle. Soon we are greeted with the small ghost town of Ballarat. Well, really a ghost building and garbage dump.

From here we drive approximately 21 miles on dirt road to the beginning of Goler pass, the red circle on the map. On our way here we pass a really nasty looking rock plant of sorts. Not sure what they are processing.

Entering the pass is a beautiful epxerience. Its such a change from the vast emptiness of the valley before. There is a small trickle of water running down the center of the trail. Huge rock walls on either side. The air is crisp and clean. After a couple miles, if that of this we come across a quite intimidating embankment we have to cross. Kind of a rock-slide of sorts.

Pictures just don’t do it justice.

There are many more videos in this series. I will provide all trail run video links at the end of this post.

It’s hard to tell the severity of the climb, but as you can see, it was difficult, but we made it. Whew.

The next couple miles of drive are pretty smooth.

We then come across a small cabin and campsite area. A beautiful location with high walls and a nice cement slab.

We continued on our trek out toward Butte Valley and Warm Springs Canyon. There was a cabin that it seemed people had rented located West of Striped Butte. This portion of the drive was a cast open plain type area. Once you entered Warm Springs, you come across an old mine site at Warm Springs Camp. Here we met an older gentleman with a fully decked out 2007 FJ Cruiser. I would list his mods here but it would take most of the article. You can see the pics of his rig.

At this point we decided that although gas was not necessary, we should find where one was located. It was suggested we travel out of Warms Springs Canyon onto 178, towards Shoshone. This was a pretty long drive. I do not recommend it if you are in this area with between 1/4 and 1/2 a tank. I probably would have driven to Furnace Creek. This is about a 20 mile longer drive, but it would have presented more opportunities. With the drive to Shoshone, we basically had to go there and all the way back for any adventure.

At this point we decided we better start planning a place to spend the night, since we were basically winging the entire weekend. After a lot of thinking, map reading and clock watching, we decided our best bet for quiet, secluded camping was to try to make it back to the Cabin within Goler Canyon by sundown. It was 2:30 and the temperature was around 55 degrees. We made it back to camp around 5:30. The sun was not up. We setup our campsite and got settled in for the night. Since we were pretty beat up from the long day, we decided to get to sleep at around 9ish. The temperature was in the 40’s. It was a long night as the temperature was in the low 30’s, but not too bad. I was able to get some sleep.

The next morning we packed up our camp, took pictures and made a plan.

We decided that today’s best course of action, in order to see the most and also find another secluded campsite, was to first head toward Stovepipe Wells via Wildrose and Emmigrant, get gas, see Mosaic Canyon and the Dunes, then head toward Panamint springs, with our eventual goal being The Racetrack at Racetrack Valley.

So we headed back out of Goler Canyon the way we came in. This brought us back out to 178 on the Trona side, in Panamint valley. We headed north on 178 onto Wildrose Canyon rd toward Wildrose, but veared left toward Nemo Canyon and Emmigrant Canyon. This was a beautiful drive, much a much longer drive time than Going toward Panamint Springs, then heading to StovePipe. It was a pretty uneventful drive without much to speak of. As a sidenote. This entire trip, and all drives were surrounded by many side trails that led to ghost towns, more mines, and many points of interest. We chose to pass a lot by as we only had so much time. I would love to do it again and drive them all.

When we reached Stovepipe Wells, we filled up on gas and used the facilities.

Then we headed into Mosaic Canyon. The Visitors Guide says: Mosaic Canyon: Polished marble walls and odd mosaic patterns of breccia make this small canyon a favorite. The twisting lower canyon is so narrow hikers must walk through it single-file. Some rock scrambling is required. The canyon opens up after 1/2 mile to reveal the heights of Tucki Mountain, but hikers can continue another 11/2 miles.

As you can see from the pictures, it was beautiful. After walking the initial 1/2 mile, it opens up into a valley. At this point we decided to turn around and focus on getting to The Racetrack, as we knew it was pretty far, and had no idea what the offroad trails had in store for us.

After leaving the Mosaic Canyon, we headed west on 190 towards Panamint Springs. Along the way we stopped and took some gorgeous pictures of Panamint Dunes. Panamint springs consists of a gas station, a general store, some lodging, and a campground. We just passed through as gas was $5.55 a gallon here and we were fine.

Immediatly past Panamint Springs was a 2.5 mile offroad trail that led to a smal natural waterfall. We drive down the trail, but then realized at the end of it that you had to hike 2 more miles to the actual waterfall. Not knowing what was ahead of us, we chose to pass and move on.

From 190 we took a trail that runs along the western border of the Death Valley National Park. This is about 8 miles of severely broken pavement. I would have rather been on dirt roads. Driving this road at 40-50 mph, and watching the potholes to make sure they werent too sharp, was like playing the most intense game of Gran Turismo ever. Except with my $30k car. lol.

After another 6 miles of similar road, we made a left at south pass and entered an area that had a lot more trees. There was actually quite a bit of snow on the ground in places. Sometimes covering the road. This was Hunter Mountain.

After leaving the mountains, we entered a valley. We then made a right at a junction that had a crazy peace sign sculpture on some rocks. This was the junction of what they called Lippincott Rd. Another location where the Death Valley map says “conditions require experienced 4-wheel drivers’. This time though, it REALLY wasnt kidding. Watch the video to see what I mean.

After about 10 minutes of debate with myself, and getting past the feeling of wanting to throw up (really), I decided to continue on. I felt that we should at least try to make it to the Racetrack and we could decide how to get out in the morning.

Well, the rest of the trail was not that bad. We left the mountain as the sun was going down, and found ourselves in a huge valley on a dry lake bed. This was The Racetrack. Our excitement level was high. We saw a small camping area tucked in the mountains to the south of The Racetrack. There seemed to be one car there already, but we needed to get over to The Racetrack before the sun set.

It was definitely worth it. The Racetrack was amazing. The energy coming from the huge lakebed was awesome. The rocks and their trails were so mysterious. The whole area was mystical.

As the sun went down, we needed to find a campsite and time was running out. We headed toward the camping area. We didnt like the idea of being near other people, but wanted to see if there was a spot not too close to them, but near the lakebed. There was a perfect spot. We set up camp. Now the temperature was beginning to drop. As we got ready to get in our tents, the car gauge said 32 degrees. We were a little concerned, but had no choice.

It was cold. Very cold. I don’t think either of us slept much. I would have said I didnt sleep except that I remember bits and pieces of some dreams. I had my mummy bag zipped down to a little hole only my mouth would fit in. Not even my nose because it would freeze. I remember reaching my arm out and scraping ice off the inside of my tent. I finally had to throw in the towel and begin my day when I realized I really really had to ‘dig a hole’. I got up, took care of business, and got in the car to thaw. It was 17 degrees. This was at 6am. How cold it was at say 2am? I have no idea, but it was colder. I have no regrets though. Being there was worth it all.

We packed up our camp, and decided to head toward the north, the opposite way we came in. This was Racetrack Vally road. We headed toward Teakettle junction. A place where people stop and sign/leave their teakettles. Pretty cool.

At this point we had a decision. Take the long north route, which was over 70 miles back to Panamint Springs, which was mostly paved road, or to attempt another off-road path that seemed to be more like 30-40 miles, but was unknown territory. We chose the off-road path. Go out with a bang. This was hidden valley rd. This was a relatively easy ride. The only problem was GPS maps. Death Valley is so huge, that just to download a local version for Goler Pass area was 500mb and took over night. Being as this was a last minute decision, I had no idea what other areas we would be in. So now I could definitely have my ipad track my route, but had no map to lay it over. I had to try to visually match it up to our tiny writing paper map. Plus, there were many trails we ran across that did not show up on the paper map. In Goler Pass area we found that the GPS maps had accurate details of all trails.

Hidden valley road eventually made its way back to the snowy hills of hunter mountain we were in earlier. This took us back to South Pass. The rest was all back tracking.

We drove back to Panamint Springs, filled up gas, aired up the tires to 50psi (Great for freeway driving, my MTs are 65psi max) and headed home. 
:)

Please visit my Flickr album for all the amazing photos from this experience. There are MANY more.

Flickr Death Valley

Here are all 8 trail videos from this adventure:

Video 1 – Ballarat to Goler Canyon

Video 2 – Goler Canyon

Video 3 – Butte Valley

Video 4 – Butte Valley to Warm Springs

Video 5 – Warm Springs to HWY 178

Video 6 – Lee Flat to Lippincott Rd.

Video 7 – Lippincott Road to The Racetrack

Video 8 – The Racetrack to Hunter Valley

Video 9 – Leaving Hunter Valley Pt1

Video 10 -Leaving Hunter Valley Pt2

Full Death Valley Jan 2012 Playlist. ALL VIDEOS

My Death Valley Trail Map

Death Valley Back Country Trail Map

Death Valley Main Map

Death Valley Guide

I just finished dialing in the basics of a new website and forum called, NeoShamans.com. What is NeoShamans about? Here is a description I wrote for the site:

Neo Shaman:

A Neo Shaman is the the final evolution of shamanism. Neo Shamans have grown up in a completely different environment than ancient shamans. This has created a new, urban-composite shaman. As our society has become so complex, so has the responsibilities of our shamans. Our societies needs have increased alongside it’s complexity. These new Shamans must have a passion to gather wide arrays of information not readily available to the public, then analyze this information and find ways to improve our current way of life. Neo-Shamans use gathered data from our past and present (and sometimes our future!).

Neo Shamans can be Techie-Shamans, Health-Shamans, Spiritual-Shamans and more. The possibilities are endless. Many of us specialize in more than one area of Knowledge.

Join us fellow adventurers, researchers and neo-shamanic-scientists.

The Gathering

Hello everyone,

Due to updates with Worspress, but not with Theme providers, you will be seeing visual changes in the appearance and layout of the blog. Please bear with me and know that all of the content will still be available. I am going to leave the current theme you see running, as it is the first one I found that supports my widgets, for a little while until I find a better one.

If any of you have any suggestions or want to help with the design, please email me.

Thanks all!

Rawb

by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor 

(NaturalNews) Rick Perry is now history as a Presidential candidate. No one wants a President who can’t even remember what he stands for, and during last night’s debates, Texas Governor Rick Perry proved himself to be frighteningly absentminded. Watch the video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6an4…

Perry: “And I will tell you, it’s three agencies of government when I get there that are gone. Commerce, education, and the uh… uh… what’s the third one there? Let’s see…”

Then Ron Paul, who of course actually knows what he’s talking about, says, “You need five!”

Perry: “Oh, five? Okay. Commerce, education, and uh, the uh… uh…”

Another candidate suggests, “EPA?”

Perry: “EPA, there you go, no.”

Then the mainstream media guy running the debate says, “Seriously? Is EPA the one you were talking about?”

Perry: “No sir. We were talking about the uh… agencies of government… EPA needs to be rebuilt…”

Media guy: “But you can’t name the third one?”

Perry: “The third agency of government I would do away with the education, uh, the uh… commerce, uh… let’s see, the… I can’t, the third one. The third one I can’t, sorry.”

This truly pathetic performance made the front page of the Drudge Report this morning, which featured a link to the 53 seconds of video that will likely go down in history as the moment the whole nation realized Rick Perry was not mentally qualified to be President.

Watch it again at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6an4…

Ron Paul’s message never changes and is never forgotten

The thing about lying all the time as a Governor is that sooner or later all those lies become too difficult to sort out, and your brain goes on the fritz. It’s so much easier to just tell the truth, isn’t it?

Ron Paul’s message remains consistent and simple: End the Fed. Cut a trillion dollars out of the federal budget. Restore liberty. Get the government out of our private lives. It’s not hard to remember because it’s based on core, fundamental principles upon which our nation was founded.

Ron Paul needs no teleprompters to give a speech. He needs no cue cards to answer a question on live television. And most of the time when he’s talking to the press, he’s schooling the reporters on fundamental economics, bringing them up to speed on the way reality operates.

Here at NaturalNews, we endorse only one candidate for President, and that’s Ron Paul. Not as a Republican or a Democrat, but as a person with wisdom and character, a person who tells the truth, and a person who stands head and shoulders above the crowd of professional liars and globalist puppets who are trying to fudge their way to the finish line. You can bet Ron Paul could name five federal agencies to eliminate, right off the top of his head, with plenty of time to spare!

Rick Perry couldn’t even name the third government agency he wanted to eliminate. But even then, why not just make one up on the spot instead of looking like a fool? Couldn’t you just whip out an answer like “The Post Office!” Or “The Pentagon!” Or how about the FDA? Or the USDA? Or take your pick among every other agency that’s run by a pack of tyrants or criminals: DEA, ATF, FTC… the list goes on.

How could you NOT think of a single federal agency to eliminate? Heck, you could probably name ANY government agency to eliminate and it would make sense. From a field of over a dozen likely targets, how could Rick Perry have failed to come up with number three?

It is with great relief, however, that Perry has now violently thrown himself out of the race. This vaccine-pushing, globalist-agenda-pimping miscreant deserves no place in the U.S. White House, and the fact that he even got this far is a terrible indictment of the gullibility and foolishness of the donors who supported him so far.

There’s only one real candidate for U.S. President, folks. His name is Ron Paul. He stands for health freedom, legalized medical marijuana, legalized hemp farming, legalized raw milk, lower taxes, greater freedom, the ending of imperialist wars and numerous other examples of liberty and common sense.

If you don’t vote for Ron Paul, don’t bother voting at all.

www.RonPaul2012.com

Article Taken from here: http://www.naturalnews.com/034113_Rick_Perry_federal_agencies.html