Camping in Death Valley NP on Presidents day long weekend

[bdighe]

Hi Friends,

 

We are planning to do camping in death valley on Presidents day long weekend

(Feb 16 to Feb 18). There is only one camp site (Furnace Creek) which takes

advance reservation, rest of the sites are on first come first take basis.

 

If we reach there by Saturday 11:00 AM, what are the chances that we will be

able to find a camp site?

 

Any other tips and suggestions are most welcomed.

 

Regards,

- Bharat

[sattler123]

Your chances will be very good - you should not have any problems at all. People come and go all teh time and 11 AM is when most folks are leaving or have left already. You'll be fine.

[keith_leonin]

Ordinarily, what the previous poster said would be true... except for the fact that AdventureCORPS is holding a 400-mile cycling tour at Furnace Creek this weekend. That means up to 100 riders, their families and friends, event organizers, etc... will be staying at Furnace Creek... I'm not saying that they are ALL camping, but there will be A LOT more people than usual.

 

Good luck!

[daverave]

If you get shut out of the designated campsites, there are several dirt roads that you can drive up and camp. They are best attempted with a 4WD vehicle as they can be quite rough but I have seen sedans on some of them. I'm thinking of some of the canyon roads west of the West Side Road. You'll have to drive a couple of miles up them to be legal. Ask a ranger at the info station. The other option, Bharat, is to throw your stuff in a backpack and hike two miles from the nearest paved road. Again there are restrictions (such as not on the valley floor) so you should ask a ranger. They have publications that explain both options. Good luck!

[bdighe]

Thanks all for your suggestions.

 

I have booked a tent site at Panamint Springs Campground which is just outside of the park. But I am still going to give a try for the sites inside the park.

[daverave]

The Panamint Valley is nearly as wonderful as Death Valley. From the Panamint Springs Campground, look north Bharat, and you can see the Panamint Dunes about 8 miles away or so. If you look carefully you can find a dirt road heading north from the main road heading to Death Valley which will take you out there. Ask at your campground for better instructions. Most of the time this road is passable by sedan. Then it is a mile or two walk into the dunes from the dirt road. It's like the Stovepipe dunes without all of the people and footprints! This photo is at those dunes:

http://www.photo.net/photo/4992883

[bdighe]

Thanks All for your tips and suggestions. We had a successful trip. We could not get a site in good campgrounds like Furnace Creek or Texas Springs but we managed to get a spot in Sunset RV parking. So we had to camp in a parking lot :) but it was way better than staying somewhere outside of the park.

 

Death Valley is paradise for photographers. I will visit here again to correct the mistakes I did during this trip. Here is the slide show of few pictures I clicked during my visit:

 

http://www.photo.net/photodb/slideshow?folder_id=811299

http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=811299

 

I will appreciate if you guys could comment on how can I improve my pictures.

 

At the very end of the trip I managed to drop my tripod with D50 and 18-200 lens mounted on it. My hood gave its life to save my lens :)