Death Valley Flowers – February 16, 2016

See more Death Valley flower photos at Ophardtphotos.com

This year in Death Valley, California they are having what is known as a Super Bloom.  Three inches of rain in October, as a result of El Nino, have really brought out very many flowers for the first time since 2005.  We were there for a couple of days in February.  The bloom has continued well into March.

In Death Valley you can find the extremes in climate from minus 282 feet below sea level (summer temperatures of 120 F) to 11,000 foot snow capped mountains.  The land area is as large as the state of Delaware.  The landscape varies from colorful sandstone rocks to volcanic rock to salt flats to sand dunes.  We also saw the remains of the Harmony Borax Works (1883-1888) made famous by the 20 mule team borax wagon train to transport the borax to the nearest railroad – a trip of 160 miles round trip in 30 days.  Click any photos to see them larger.