Roam Away from Home: Part II

Ghost Town

April, 2013 - Death Valley National Park, CA

The rain fly ruffled in the morning breeze as I awoke. I quietly crept over Tomek and unzipped the tent, walking out into the chill morning. Unseen morning doves and quail called out soothingly, and the distant mountains to the east were painted in a soft lavender as the sun emerged from behind the range.

I sipped on the dusty water from my canteen to rinse the morning taste out of my mouth. My movements alerted Lucy, who now grumbled to be let out of the tent. Soon, all of us were awake, sitting in our chairs, watching the sun rise as coffee percolated.

"What's for breakfast?" I asked.

"That's the best part," French responded. "We're going out for breakfast."

We drove in to Lone Pine, a quaint frontier-style town with old signs boasting Rosewood font signage. It was quiet and sunny, just a few cars driving and a couple people ambling about. It reminded me of a prettier Beatty, NV. We parked across the street from the Alabama Hills Cafe and walked in. Most of the seats were taken by dusty old men in cowboy hats and women with sun kissed skin. Other than that, it was like any townie breakfast joint I've ever been in (my favorite kind of place to get breakfast--gritty and greasy). Before this trip, I'd never had biscuits and gravy, but now it was all I could think about (though, I would have gotten chilaquiles if it was on the menu). With a heaping of that with some scrambled eggs to boot, I was full of food and fury, and ready to tackle the day.

Before leaving town, we stopped at a local outdoors store to grab a couple last-minute items: Granola bars, some extra rope, Tom needed a hat and I wanted a Lone Pine t-shirt. As Tom was perusing the hat selection, the store clerk, a younger woman with sinewy skin, made note of my hat.

"This one here is pretty good," She said to Tomek. "But you won't find anything as good as that hat," she said with stinging sarcasm as she nodded to me.

"It's a fucking great hat!" I scowled.

"Sure it is," she replied, cocksure.

What does she know, I thought to myself as I put down a shirt featuring local animal tracks and walked out of the store, grumpily. You don't remark on a man's hat, especially if your selection contains hats only suitable for gardening old women. (Nope, not bitter at all!)

*     *     *     *

With Lucy in my lap, we roared across the desert back towards Panamint Valley. I watched the Sierras dwindle out of sight as house music blared over the speakers. Steph texted me that Boston was safe now and I replied that I would probably be out of touch until the following night, told her where I'd be and how long we planned on being there (so someone would know where to look for us if we didn't return, always a good idea). 

We were back up in the mountains, nearing Father Crowley Point, when Tom spoke up.

"Could we get a change in music?"

"Huh? Oh, sure!" Alice replied.

Some other sort of thumping beat synth music came over the speakers. The new music was indiscernible from the last to Tom and me, but Alice and French had very strong opinions about each type. We spotted a bro-y looking man driving a black jeep with an open cabin blast by.

"I wouldn't be doin' that," Alice said. "Not in this heat."

Cruising down toward the valley, I asked if I could play some music. Alice passed the ipod wire back and I plugged in my device. Scrolling through, I found the ideal album: Canyon Candy by Javelin (not a fan of their other albums, but I do enjoy that particular collection). The low thundery vocals of "Cowpoke" reverberated in the car as we took an abrupt turn onto Panamint Valley Road, which cut directly down the middle of the valley. Surrounded on both sides by the vast, open, empty desert, the rolling mountains flowed past us, dark like dried blood and foreboding. The corridor we travelled down reminded me of Tatooine (which was partially filmed in Death Valley). Out in the desert, we could spy little dirt roads snaking through the sparse creosote plants that dotted the landscape. Ahead, our vehicle slowed and we turned down a dirt road. We passed a sign embedded in a stone structure that read "BALLARAT." It was an abandoned mining town, founded in 1897 before falling into disuse in 1905. All around us, derelict trucks, trailers and mobile homes dotted the run down settlement. Old shipping containers and tractor trailers were scattered around. Earthen structures with corrugated tin roofs sat rusting and crumbling in the Mojave sun, abandoned, forlorn. The whole place stood like a vestige of a long forgotten war, of a dead civilization. You could still feel the presence of the humans who lived here, though all but one had long left this place.

We pulled up to a fresher looking wood building with a Coca Cola sign and a lightly tattered American flag fluttering in the wind. We stopped and out walked a singular man. Greasy hair slicked back and dark, beady eyes, his skin was hardened by the sun and his belly pronounced from beer. In dusty jeans and a soiled sleeveless shirt, he had a fierce air about him, but not altogether unfriendly, probably the kind of personality garnered from being the sole inhabitant of a dead town miles away from the next nearest settlement. This was Rock Novak. He greeted us as he wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his arm.

"Where y'all headen' to?" He inquired with an accent all his own, like someone chewing cotton.

"We're going to make our way up to Panamint City." French replied.

"Pan-mint City, eh?" He pondered that for a moment, cocking his head to the side, looking up towards the mountains. "Good hike. Ain' done it 'n years m'self. Should be good time. Seent a bunch of boy scouts make their way up ther not yesterdey," he chuckled. "Figure y' might seen 'em up ther. How long y' plannin' 'n stayin' up ther?"

"Just for the night. Come back down in the morning."

"Welp, sounds good...good. If y' don' come back down, I'll tell the search par-t where t' look for y'." He laughed again.

We hopped back in the car and rolled down the window. Rock came towards us and pointed up the road.

"Jus' keep on 'iss road, take a right and y'll be at the lot for Su-prise Cany'n." He waved us off.

*     *     *     *

The road up to the trailhead was rough. To our left, a dry creek bed grew wild with cottonwood, red willow and creosote bushes. The mountains came up on both sides of us, and slowly the valley behind us disappeared from view. In the parking lot, there were more cars than I had anticipated, all parked in front of some mangled structures and pieces of mining equipment, the wood and metal both oxidized and sunburnt to the same color.

It was hot as we checked our bags, the sun now rising ahead of us, lazily filling the canyon with fiery light. I covered every surface with sunscreen, checked my bag, signed our names into the log book, and we made our way to the trail, following the dry creek as we went. 

The canyon walls around us were bleached white, with the mountains standing above them were painted like blood and brick. As the creek wound its way up the pass, it would guide us into the shade before launching us back into the unforgiving light. Soon, towering trees, fed by the now-trickling stream, provided refuge from the sun. The further up the canyon we went, the fatter the creek grew until we could hear it splashing beyond. Lucy waded through the water, taking sips of it as she went. Ahead, we spotted a large pool at the base of a waterfall.

"Are we going to climb up that?" Tom asked. There was no way around it.

"Look to the middle," French pointed. "See how it's got those stairs almost? That's the way you want to go up."

"Barefoot?" I asked, as the "stairs" were saturated with submerged moss.

"We're going to be walking through the creek for a bunch of the hike, so you might as well leave them on," Alice answered. "They're gonna get wet anyway."

We dropped our bags on the dry beach below an overhanging ledge. After French climbed up, I submerged my legs in the cool, crisp pool and scrambled up the mossy stairs, my feet slightly slipping as I went. French grabbed my hand and we made our way to the ledge to hoist up our bags and the puppy. She looked about confusedly, her feet occasionally kicking like a turtle plucked from the water. She was restful by the time we got her up, her tongue hanging lazily from her mouth, her tail wagging in excitement at seeing people she'd been separated from for an eternity of minutes. After Tom and Alice made their way up, we rested for a moment, listening to the soothing waterfall before moving on. 

There were several smaller waterfalls along the way and the trail kept mostly to the middle of the creek. Our feet wet and cool while our bodies were singed by the midday sun, we darted between red willow groves and enjoyed the shade as we went. Surprise Creek fattened ahead and we were launched into a flooded forest, our bodied bent over from the low canopy. I noticed a small object dart at my feet, but assumed it was some stream-smoothed pebble splashing in the torrent. But again I saw another. And another.

"Yo, guys," I called behind me. "Are there frogs up here?"

"We don't have any frogs registered in the park." An answer came from behind.

"Come here and check this out." I hollered back over the clatter of the creek. 

Alice came up and I pointed to the ground ahead of us. Sure enough, there was a small frog with a green body, khaki appendages and a black slit down its side.

"That's a pacific tree frog!" Rejoiced Alice. We pushed on.

Suddenly, the water stopped. The trees still covered us, but the trail was once again dry and dusty. we stopped to rest next to a cave, taking sips of water as we pitched stones into the darkened abyss. 

"I don't think we're going to have as good a resting place after this 'til we get to the top." Alice said.

"Lunch?" Asked Tomek, his mind always to food. I grabbed my sandwich out before anyone else agreed.

Low bushes and dried stalks of dead grass lined the trail as we made our way to Limekiln Spring. The dried grass was firm and whipped us as we passed. The backs of my legs began to sting. The trail rose up rocky from the wash and lifted us away from the cover of trees. Below, we could hear the faint trickle of the spring below the sun scorched leaves. Ahead, the canyon forked and the plant life changed to scattered creosote, sage and desert holy. Vibrantly colored collared lizards shot across the path and basked on the rocks, their turquoise, reds and yellows vibrating off the steely stones on which they sat. I whooped at every one I saw, as they are my favorite lizard and I'd never expected to see one in the wild. (I'd adopted one from a classmate as a kid. It's name was "Liz," as in "short for lizard." A condition of my adoption was I could not rename it. In retrospect, I don't know why I never did, as I neither hung out with the former owner nor do reptiles learn their names. Plus that is a damn lazy name. Sidenote, that lizard needed an expensive surgery when his rectum came out, but he survived for several more years. Go figure.)

The next two thousand feet of elevation were arduous to say the least. As the canyon runs east-west, the sun sat above us the whole time. There was no cover. We passed Brewery Spring, but the trail ran outside of its grove, so we merely watched the shade as we passed. The trail itself narrowed, with little game paths running along side it. Burro scat paved most of the trail at this point, ranging in freshness from shiny and wet, brimming with flies to dried and blown away, appearing more like lawnmower clippings than animal waste.

"Some of this scat looks pretty fresh, don't you think?" I asked.

"No, it's pretty old. Don't get your hopes up on seeing any burros." Alice replied.

"They live up here?"

"Yeah, we have a lot of them all over the park. But they don't usually make themselves known."

"We need to worry if we see one?"

"No. Unless it's an aggressive male, he might charge. But if we hold our ground, he'll back off."

"I think there's a guy who sells burro meat down in Ballarat." French chimed in.

"Can we get some?" Tom and I pleaded.

"We'll see," French responded, like a dad offering a glimmer of hope to kids asking for ice cream.

We spoke little, admiring the canyon as we walked. It looked like a torrential mudslide had been frozen in time, bulbous and tumbling as it made its way to the pass. Deep reds, ivory and rust. At the intersection of Cannon, Woodpecker and Surprise canyons, we could see all the way to the terminus of the pass. The mountains beyond were dotted with pinyon pine, lovely and rich against our austere surroundings.

The back of my legs began to feel sickly hot. I tried to peer at them, but with my pack in the way, I couldn't get a glimpse. I waited for Alice and French to catch up.

"Hey guys," I asked wearily. "Do my legs look sunburned?"

They paused, droning an "uh" before answering.

"They're not looking too good," French replied.

"Did you put sunscreen on them?" Asked Alice.

"Yeah, when we left."

"But what about the second time?"

"Shit!" I became angered at myself.

"Alright, we'll let's put some on now," Alice said handing me the bottle of 50 SPF sunscreen.

I cursed at myself as I slathered on the warm liquid.

You can kind of make at least one out in the center.

I rolled down the legs of my jorts and we moved on quietly. As we proceeded, the burro scat piles became more numerous, the desolate canyon loomed above us. I kept my eyes to the nooks and paths that scrambled away from the main pass. There was a feeling of being watched and it made our troop uneasy. Would we stumble upon a burro, or a lion stalking them, my paranoid mind wondered, wandered. Ahead, there was an earthen platform that overlooked the trail, and Tom pointed to it.

"Check it out!"

Standing in the middle of the ledge was a burro, barely visible, camouflaged effectively by its dusty brown coat. We stood and admired it for a bit, waiting to see if it would make a move. It did not, but soon, another head emerged from behind the ledge. And another. And another. Soon there were five or six burros all standing above us, their black eyes watching us as we approached. Lucy wagged her tail curiously. We were within a few yards of them and stopped again. The trail brought us to the foot of the shelf and we were weary they might approach when we came too close. They stood as silent and still as the mountains around them. A light breeze was the only sound in the canyon. We pushed on, their dopey heads turning to watch us as we moved up the trail.

Along the cliff walls, we began to notice foundations for small structures. Alice explored a cave to see if there was any evidence of human habitation while we waited on the trail--there was none. The sun was waning when we first saw the chimney stack come into focus. Now, pinyon clung to the cliff walls and evidence of human habitation became more evident.

Finally, we arrived at Panamint City. Above us, we could see myriad structures: The chimney, a long warehouse devoid of walls, some sort of building way up the ridge, a cabin and others. We could hear the boy scouts rummaging for firewood.

"They must have taken the Hilton. Damnit." Alice spoke, dismayed at loosing the ghost town's premier cabin.

"We can take the other cabin up the hill." said French.

We turned back and made our way past the low pinyon on our way up Sourdough Canyon. A derelict bulldozer and some rusted out trucks lined the way, with countless rusty tin cans littering the ground. The cabin came into view, disused and rustic with a sheet metal roof and a long front porch. Two immense dogs began barking ferociously. French restrained Lucy as a man came out from the darkened depths of the cabin. He was dirty, with a baseball cap on, wearing a sleeveless button-up shirt, holding a beer in his hand. It almost looked like he lived there.

"Hidy." He said, making no effort to quiet his beasts.

"Hullo," hollered Alice. "Staying up here?"

"For the foreseeable." He responded dully.

"Alright..."

"I'm guessing he doesn't want us up here," Tom said.

"I'm inclined to agree," I spoke, eyeing the man as he sat down on a chair on the porch. "Where're we going to camp if the boy scouts are down at the main camp."

"Don't worry," said French quietly. "There's another spot."

*     *     *     *

We sat overlooking the canyon, our tents set up around a smaller, rustic cabin, it's vertical wooden beams charred by decades of unforgiving sun. The buildings were rather well-kept, as volunteer groups take great pains to keep them intact, sometimes at the cost of their historical integrity (much to the chagrin of Alice). Inside, there were beds, but also copious amounts of vermin scat, so we decided to camp where there was not a risk of hanta. Nearby, there was an old shed behind a chicken wire-enclosed vegetable garden, its crops long gone. Surrounding it were lush green irises, and Lucy collapsed in them, rolling about with great ecstasy.

We set about sautéing red onion, two bell peppers, a zuke and a kielbasa as jambalaya rice boiled in a pot. Once the rice was done, we added the sauteed items, cheddar cheese and a few cans of Bumblebee canned chipotle chicken (can't get it out here, I've looked, but you can sometimes find canned buffalo chicken!) to the rice, and there it was: backpacking jambalaya. My stomach growled and my mouth salivated as I watched French pour dinner onto my tray. By now the sun was low and we lit our dinner with headlamps. I dug in, washing the food down with a lukewarm Porkslap pale ale (warm beer is usually better than no beer).

The sun was gone and the night grew cold. After we finished our meal and cleaned our dishes, we walked down a stone stairwell to a disused fire pit surrounded by a semicircular stone bench. The fire alight, we spoke loosely of the days travels, the history of Panamint City, my sun-stung legs and of sleep. Sweet, glorious sleep. I sat inflating my air mattress, my head light from the constant exhalation. Soon the fire shrank to but a glow and we covered it with dirt and water before wandering off to our tents. I laid down in my bag and stuffed my jacket under my head. I checked my phone, thinking perhaps I could get a small signal to tell Steph that all was well, but, of course, there was no service. As soon as I turned my phone back off, I was lost to the world and my sleep was empty of dreams.

*     *     *     *

I awoke with a start. I could hear the distant commotion of the boy scouts making breakfast and breaking camp. My nose was dry and felt as though it was on the precipice of bleeding. I went to pull my head up, but my lips were caked to my sleeping bag. I pulled the nylon away as my lips cracked, the sweet taste of nickel in my mouth. Below my head were traces of dried blood. I wetted my kerchief and washed the bits of blood from my face before venturing out to the dry, chill morning. As soon as I'd unzipped my tent, Lucy began to moan in Alice and French's tent, and soon everyone was up. We made quick work of breaking down the camp and boiling water for coffee and oatmeal--a speedy breakfast seemed prudent.

We sipped our bitter coffee and watched as the boy scouts made their way down the canyon. Once they were out of sight, we grabbed our packs (which were delightfully lighter without all the food/beer in them) and made our way down to Panamint City. Most of the buildings seemed newer, perhaps no more than forty years old. Unlike the cabins, however, they were in great disrepair. Inside a mostly-ruined warehouse, where empty cans and work benches covered in rusty nails were scattered about the room, we found the well water faucet and set about filtering our bladders. The place was heavy with the ghosts of those who once lived here, but their civilization was gone now, dead—a relic of a world that is no longer. 

We walked into the Hilton, the largest, best-kept cabin of the three. On its front porch looking down on the canyon and the valley beyond, there were rusted gears and metal pieces hung from wires that acted as crude wind chimes. Inside, the cabin was well swept, clean, with a small kitchen and some decent-looking bunks. We walked past the towering brick chimney, built in the 1870s. Its shadow stretched down towards the canyon, and we followed it out.

The backs of my legs stung fiercely as we went, the sun kissing them with every step. Oh! how I could not wait for noon to pass and the sun to be before us. As we walked again through the tall, dry grass, the stalks whipped me ferociously as I went. I contemplated switching to pants, but the day was already too warm, so I seethed instead, waiting for the grass to make way for scattered creosote. We saw no burros and no other people on our way down, and there was no breeze--the canyon was deathly still. We passed quietly by familiar sights: The cave, frogs hopping in the creek, small waterfalls. We lowered Lucy down to French before making the slow, refreshing scramble back down the mossy rocks of the larger fall. At the bottom, we rested, soaking our feet (and my sunburnt legs) in the cool pool, attempting to entice Lucy into the lagoon (she was not a big swimmer at the time, but a few summers in Death Valley have since changed that).

When we arrived back in the parking lot, it was after noon. The mountains on the other side of the valley stood distorted in the midday heat, and our lungs labored in the dry air. There was only one other car in the lot. We signed our names out of the log book, got in the car, and made our bumpy way back to the highway, waving to Rock Novak as we passed. But we did not stop, dear reader, for we had a destination that could not wait.

Blasting out of the hot, flat playa, we headed west towards a small settlement in the foothills of the Argus mountains: Panamint Springs Resort. We pulled up to a rustic looking, one-story building, flanked by large palmetto trees, with a large, open front porch. A sign above the front steps simply read: 

RESTAURANT

PIZZA • BURGERS • SALADS

A few German tourists sat out front and stared at us as we walked up, whispering to each other with curious excitement. Inside it was cool and dark. A burl wood counter wrapped around the bar. I turned to a well-lit room to my right and oh! what a sight! Three convenience store refrigerators stood side by side, each one filled top to bottom with beer. Of all breweries and brews. Dozens upon dozens of beers. So many, I became lost and panicked, as I often do when given too many good choices. I asked Alice what I should pick.

"There are no bad choices here."

Wonderful. I picked one I knew and I loved and I could not get back east: Mammoth Brewery's 395 IPA. I walked to meet my friends outside. One of the German tourists stopped me.

"Are you a cowboy?" She asked curiously.

"No, sorry. I'm just a fella, like everyone else," I said, channelling my Clint Eastwood.

She didn't look disappointed, but turned away disinterested. I walked to our table on the porch with a smile as wide as the brim of my hat. We ordered gluttonously: French fries, fried zucchini strips and a large BBQ chicken pizza, of which had been foretold before we even bought our plane tickets. Soon, our appetizers came out and we noshed while trading sips of each others beers, staring off into the arid land around us. When the pizza finally came out, 18" wide cut into 16 delectable slices, I felt my stomach jump. Covered in a 4 cheese blend, the symphony of smoked gouda, barbeque sauce, chicken and red onions was the most delicious thing I could remember beholding. We each took our slices and cherished every bite while sipping down the last of our beers.

We spoke with our waitress for a time after we paid. She told us how just the day before they had to call in a med-evac for an off road driver suffering from severe heat stroke. It appears that the gentleman braved the +100 degree playa in his coverless jeep with no water for drinking in the midday sun.

"Was it a black jeep?" Alice asked.

"Why yes, it was," the waitress kindly replied.

"We saw him on our way through yesterday."

"Well, we still have his jeep out back. Hope he can come to get it."

*     *     *     *

The day wore on as we made it back to Death Valley. We stopped at the Stovepipe Wells store to peruse their selection of t-shirts and tchotchkes. Outside, there was a pay phone (how retro!), and I scrounged the change in my pocket and made a call to Steph, as I had not spoken to her in some time. All was fine in Boston. The city had finally calmed down after a tumultuous week. She seemed happy to hear that I had not died (although she gave me some ribbing for suffering a sunburn), but her voice was tired, perhaps she was worn out from the last few days' events. I told her I'd be home soon and that I'd call her later on.

We pulled up to the Mesquite Dunes. There were some tourists yet walking around, but the sun was beginning to set and most folks were turning in. In our trunk, we had a bocci ball set and we wandered out into the sands for a few games. Lobbing the cannonball-sized orbs about the dunes, we joked that we hoped we wouldn't hit anyone on the far side of the sandy sea. Our last match finished, we sat on the crest of a dune and watched the distant mountains as the sunset cascaded across the clear sky. 

The next day we said our farewell to French, as he had to go to work. Alice drove us back to Las Vegas and stopped for lunch at a casino that brewed their own beer. We tried a few types, none of them particularly notable, but all quite potable. The bartender was boisterous and ever-hospitable, and we spent a great deal of time debating whether he was a wondrous character or a drunk. We ate some bar food and Tom tried a house-made root beer blended with jaeger that the barkeep insisted he have (it was quite good!). I made a pitstop at the bathroom, which featured ashtrays above the urinals, and walked passed the penny slots to pay our tab (astoundingly only $25). Then, we drove through the throngs of lights towards the airport. Our return to civilization was now assured.

It was a sorrowful goodbye. Going home not only meant leaving friends that I may not see again for some time, it also meant returning to the harsh realities at home, coming to terms with all that had happened. I sat on the plane, drowning out the harsh shouting of the children that surrounded me with a David Sedaris audiobook, and watched the spartan desert landscape pass below us. Looking upon the canyon-carved land, I marveled. What a land it is out there. One where no matter how much of it you see, there is much more unknown. An open land, and uncertain land.