After miles of moon rock-like nothing, the Furnace Creek Inn and Ranch edge into view like one of those mirages out of an old Abbott and Costello movie. We’re in Death Valley National Park mid-Summer, about 120 miles northwest of Las Vegas, and it is a blistering 50c. We stay of course, on the Ranch, looking forward to playing cowboys - at least for just a day.
Checked in, we unload the car quickly, running breathlessly between it and our room, from air-conditioning to air-conditioning. The heat is the cause of our breathlessness this time, not our fitness. It is suffocating.
We brave the heat to join others watching the sun set at Zabriskie Point, which it does beautifully, casting moody shadows on the hardened dunes. It’s the “thing to do” - possibly the only thing one can do in that heat other than swim or hit the golf course, which we are told, at around 215 feet below sea level, is the lowest in the world - before an all-American dinner of hamburger and fries in the diner served by an aging waitress with a southern drawl. Then it’s off to the saloon for a beer served in a chilled to the point of frosty glass by a bearded “dude”. It could have been a scene out of the Last Picture Show. This place is just made for the movies.
There is no let up from the suffocating heat at night. So despite the clearest, blackest and starriest night we have ever seen, we can bear only minimal time admiring it in the absolute silence. We soon want – no, need – the comfort of the cold in our air-conditioned room.
The next day we start out hiking along the dried up riverbeds at Zabriskie Point but end up dehydrated and exceedingly tetchy after only 15 minutes, so cut it short and head to the visitor centre instead, mainly to cool down. The drive out of Death Valley later is superb. Endless flat beige surrounds us under similarly endless blue sky. The road is long and straight and hot with illusory shimmering water on its surface. We stop to see slithering snake marks on the sand dunes and to regularly douse our car’s engine with the water provided along the way to prevent the otherwise inevitable overheating. The resultant plumes of steam fascinate us every time.
It’s a complete other world that we feel privileged to have experienced. And unlike some of the other similarly unwise tourists to have tried a hike in the lowest, hottest and driest place in North America, we feel privileged to have survived.

www.nps.gov/deva/index.htm; www.furnacecreekresort.com
Death Valley, California 92328
Highway 190, Death Valley, 92328
+1 760.786.2345
Google map: bit.ly/emNCbS

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A road trip through California’s Death Valley is really just like it is in the movies: driving miles upon miles through atmospheric and desolate landscape, only passing the odd Harley Davidson, and sign to helpfully tell you ‘no gas for next 100 miles’. The Eureka Valley sand dunes in the northwest of the park are spectacular and the hike up to the summit is well worth the effort for the amazing views! Stay at the nearby Stovepipe Wells Village and enjoy a cold beer on the porch while gazing over the dunes and desert as the setting sun turns everything red -magic.

On Hwy 190 between Panamint Springs and Furnace Creek.
www.stovepipewells.com/
www.nps.gov/deva/index.htm
Google map: bit.ly/eEnfG8

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