My daughters and I went overlanding through Death Valley National Park for spring break. 3 nights. 230 miles off road with some pavement miles between off road sections. We took a general south to north route entering the park at the southern terminus of Harry Wade Road and exiting the park at Eureka Valley in the north. Sights visited: Ibex Dunes, Saratoga Springs, Death Valley proper, Rhyolite ghost town, Titus Canyon, Darwin Falls, Hunter Mountain, Hidden Valley, Racetrack Valley, Racetrack Playa, Ubehebe Crater, Eureka Valley, Eureka Dunes. This is not a full trip report with pics of all the sights. Just a few (crappy) pics of an off-road prepped XC70 in use. I wish I had pics or video of the most spectacular event, blasting through maybe 300 yards of the finest silt you've ever seen. They call it deep sand in the warnings, but it's actually super-fine powdery silt on a dry lake bed (Hidden Valley). I called to my kids to warn them, "Deep sand, I'm not stopping," and kept the hammer down until we were through. When we first hit the pit, the car slowed rapidly and pitched forward like I was braking. I thought we were screwed, but then, the weight shifted back to the rear, the rear wheels grabbed, and the car took off like a rocket ship. This all happened in about 2 seconds. And we were off to the races. Toward the end, we plunged into a deeper section, and the nose scooped the powdery soil and threw it up over the windshield blinding us momentarily. That would have been a brochure-worthy action shot. LOL The kids enjoyed the ride (meanwhile I was white knuckling it the whole time hoping we made it through). We were traveling alone, so it would have sucked to get stuck in one of the most remote valleys of the park.

So, in chronological order...

We didn't approach our first camp until well after dark. So, here we are crossing Death Valley with the navigator registering 279 ft below sea level.


Sunrise at the first camp. I wanted my daughters to experience the sunrise in Death Valley, so I took them to a camp site that I stayed at in 2019 by myself when I wanted to get away one weekend and wake up in the middle of nowhere. This is a dispersed campsite along Trail Canyon Rd. about half way up the bajada on the west side of Death Valley. It's about 700 ft above the valley floor. I've backed the XC up on some rocks to level it. The camp site is on the sloped bajada, so it just wasn't going to be comfortable for my daughters to sleep in the back on such a big downhill slope. They got "Chateau Volvo" accomodations. I got a cot outside. Sunrise is coming from over the Amargosa Range on the opposite side of the valley.


Expanded view of our camp and the sunrise from the west side of Death Valley.


Day 2. Midday at the crest of Titus Canyon Rd. This spot is called Red Pass for obvious reasons (about 5,300 ft). You can see bits of the road that we traversed winding through the mountains on the right of the picture.


Couple shots of the limestone walls of Titus Canyon.






Sunrise at camp 2. Hunter Mountain Rd., about 7,000 ft. We're now in an alpine forest with overnight temps in the 30's. Yes, there's a lot more to Death Valley National Park than 130 deg F temps at Furnace Creek and altitudes below sea level. I didn't prepare for 30 deg temps., so I was a little cold overnight on a cot under the stars. I wasn't expecting to camp this high, but my planned campsite was occupied, so we had to continue on up the mountain until we found something.


Morning, day 3. A nice view as we start to descend into Hidden Valley on Hunter Mountain Rd. The XC is still relatively clean as we haven't hit the sand trap, yet.


A shot at Tea Kettle Junction. We just went through Hidden Valley and the warned-about deep sand. That was fun. We brought a lot of Hidden Valley back home with us.


Lunch at the famous Racetrack Playa.


Approaching Eureka Dunes. These dunes are impressive. Said to be the second highest in the US. Quite a site to behold as you approach the dunes via Eureka Valley Rd.


Lastly, sunrise at our final camp at Eureka Dunes.


Brett