Five years ago, on October 18, 2015 a major rain event blasted Death Valley, dumping nearly 3 inches of rain in 5 hours. All that water, in a place that normally receives less than 2 inches of rain a year!
I was there. It was my first day back at work for the winter season.
Flood waters demolished the infrastructure at Scotty’s Castle. The power of water completely wiped out major roads at both the north and south ends of the park. The park still hasn’t completely recovered. Scotty’s Castle, a historic mansion and major tourist draw, remains closed.
The salt flats at Badwater were transformed into a ten-mile-long shimmering lake. The rainstorm was severe enough to leave its mark on the geologic record. A massive debris flow slid down the main wash on Artist’s Drive, filling the wash from end to end, plastering the walls of the canyon over 10 feet above its bed whenever the mudflow rounded a tight curve. That deluge of mud and debris will still show up, tens of thousands of years from now, compressed into just another layer in the canyon wall.
Later that winter, the flowers began to bloom, more than I had ever seen in the eight years I worked there, a Superbloom brought on by the extensive rains.
This is a very different winter. I’m staying in Alaska, due to Covid and the uncertain times we are living through. Water transforms this landscape also, but it takes different forms. This is a land of frost, ice and snow, as renowned for the cold as Death Valley is for its heat.
When I worked at Death Valley, visitors would comment, “Wow, you go from one extreme to the other!” “Not really”, I would reply. After all I was avoiding the extremes. Winter temperatures in the desert were mostly between 50° and 80° Fahrenheit. That’s the same range you’ll find in McCarthy in the summer.
But there are actually a lot of similarities between Death Valley and Alaska, more than most people realize.
They’re both vast. Wrangell-St. Elias in Alaska, encompassing 13 million acres, is the biggest park in the country. Death Valley, at 3.4 mill, is the biggest national park in the lower 48.
They’re both a geologist’s dream, tectonically active with a lot of different types of rock, a lot of mountain ranges, a lot of different processes going on. Oh, the stories these rocks could tell!
Another interesting similarity is the way the plants adapt to the extreme temperatures in both locales. Although one place is unbelievably hot and the other incredibly cold, plants use many of the same adaptations to deal with those extremes; things like fuzzy jackets on the leaves to insulate the tender tissues, or tiny belly flowers growing very low to the ground to stay out of the wind.
They’re both wild and untamed, lands where you could end up in a whole lot of trouble in a very short time if you don’t pay attention.
And they’re both astoundingly, hauntingly, beautiful.
Sometimes even when the processes are not similar, the results may, for some strange reason, look somewhat similar…
Thank you, Amy, for bringing us this week’s Lens-Artists Photo Challenge, Then and Now.
This is the best of the best.
WooHoo! SO glad you liked it!
Wow. Love your ability to share these two parks with us both in words and photos. Thank you Dianne!
Thanks, Maria. I’m glad you liked the post!
Fascinating and informative series. Polar opposites so much alike. Beautiful photos too. Well done.
Thank you, John. Glad you enjoyed it.
Amazing!! Thank you for sharing these remarkable photos!
Thanks, Amy!
Wow Dianne, what an amazing post. Most of us have no concept of either place really. I’ve been to Alaska and to Death Valley but saw both with the eyes of a nature lover, a photographer, and a neophyte when it comes to geology. You’ve opened my eyes to a whole new world. On once thing we surely agree, both places are astoundingly beautiful.
Yay, sounds like I’m doing my job as a rambling ranger! Thank you, Tina, very much for your kind words.
Fascinating comparison between two environments I would have expected to be total opposites! I love how you bring out the similarities as well as the differences. And that photo of reflections on the water in Death Valley is amazing!
Thanks, Sarah! I could go on and on about the similarities (rich mining history, paleontological wonders, etc.), as well as the differences. As a ranger, I’ve always wanted to do an evening program highlighting them, but never got around to it.
I love that your blog takes me to faraway places I am currently unable to visit. Beautiful photos too 😍
Thank you Jimmy. I’m glad you could come armchair traveling with me!
That’s amazing Dianne, all that water in the desert. Must have been scary, debris flows can be so destructive. I wonder if it’s a cyclical occurrence, every 20 years or so. It’s fascinating when you watch the weather and see the cycles. A great post and interesting comparison of your 2 places.
Thanks, Wendy. They called it a “thousand-year flood”, but they had one in the 1990’s that was just as big, so I don’t know. It is somewhat cyclical, as these big rainstorms are El Nino effects. Climate change experts predict them to be more frequent in the future.
superb photos of both parks. Thank you so much for sharing them with us.
You are welcome, Geri. I’m so glad you enjoyed them.