Death Valley :: Zabriskie Point

Wednesday, March 7th - - I was tempted to spend another night at the motel in Pahrump because the strong winds were still blowing. But the sun was shining and patches of blue sky were showing through the clouds and the weather forecast called for diminishing winds later in the day. There was still quite a bit of dust in the air and the mountains in the distance were rather hazy looking. It was late morning when I left Pahrump and the drive to Death Valley National Park was rather nice. There wasn't a lot of traffic to fight with and I was driving into the wind so the van wasn't buffeted from the side like all day Tuesday.

Having been stationed in California, I have visited Death Valley several times the latest being in April 2010. Like many of our National Parks, each time you visit you see things in a different way. The quality of the light is always different depending upon the time of day and other atmospheric conditions. And the light is what makes things seem to appear different. Because there was so much sand and dust in the air I concentrated this time on the closer views at Zabriske Point, abstracting Mother Nature a bit. There is no sense of dimension in the photos, no way to tell how large or how small the mounds of dirt and rocks really are...