I visited Death Valley National Park during a road trip with my cousins, and honestly, it felt like we had landed on another planet. It’s one of the hottest, driest, and lowest places on earth, and it’s right in California and Nevada!
Death Valley covers a large area bigger than the whole state of Delaware. The name sounds spooky, but the park is full of life, history, and mind blowing facts.
It holds the record for the highest temperature ever recorded on earth i.e 134°F back in 1913 at a place called Furnace Creek. No joke, the air there actually felt like it was coming from an oven.
Even though it’s super dry, the park is home to animals like coyotes, roadrunners, bighorn sheep, and even tiny pupfish that live in salty water. And the plants? You’ll see strange ones like creosote bushes and joshua trees that are perfectly adapted to the desert.
If you go in spring after a rare rain, you might even catch the “super bloom”, the desert floor turns colorful with wildflowers. Its seriously stunning. The park’s lowest point is Badwater Basin, which sits 282 feet below sea level. It’s basically a giant salt flat, and when you walk on it, it crunches like snow under your feet.
There are also mysterious places like Racetrack Playa, where huge rocks seem to move across the ground by themselves, leaving trails behind. And if you’re into stargazing, this place has some of the darkest skies in the U.S., the stars are unbelievably bright.
Just a few miles away, you can drive up to Dante’s View and look down on it all. The temperature drops fast as you go higher, which honestly feels like magic when you’re escaping the heat.
Death Valley is also full of stories from the past. Gold miners, ghost towns, and Native American history all live in this harsh but beautiful landscape. If you ever go, just remember to carry water, wear a hat, and be ready to be thrilled.
