Day 10

This morning we left Beatty and drove back into Death Valley, this time to the area called "Furnace Creek", which is in the southern part of the valley (yesterday we toured mainly the northern part).

First we drove to the ruins of an old Borax mine (Borax is a kind of salt used in different materials like fiberglass and detergents for example). The Borax used to be refined at the mine itself and then a 20 mule team pulled it about 165 miles to different locations in California where it would be sold and shipped. Can you imagine making a trip like that in the scorching heat and in very rough terrain with a cart weighting about 30 tons? I can't.

After that we drove to a place called "Salt Creek", where a stream of very salty water runs (salt was a key element in our day). In winter there is a unique kind of fish, called a "Pup Fish", that lives there (and no where else in the world!), but since it is the end of summer there were hardly any water and no fish to be seen.

From there we continued to a place called "The Devil's Golf Course", which is a huge (and I do mean huge) plane of crystallized salt. In the photos you can see Elad sitting on it. Doesn't it look like you could salt skate on it? Those salt plains are really vast and they stretch all the way to another place we visited called "Bad Water". There's a salt lake there and it's also the lowest place in the western hemisphere. It's also the place where the highest temperature in the valley was measured: 57°!!!! That happened in the early 1900 and it's the third hottest temperature to be measured anywhere in the world (The hottest was measured in Libya).

The last place we visited is called "The Artist's Palette". It's a place in the mountains where the sand reacts with the Oxygen in the air and turns very colorful as you can see from the photos.

Elad: So far it was Noa writing. As you can tell, she was very excited about Death Valley. I wasn't. However, the second part of the day was the part I enjoyed much better.
We set off from Death Valley towards the Amargosa Opera House, which is a motel in a restored opera house right outside of the valley. However, upon getting there, we discovered that it looks much worse in reality than it did on the internet when we made our reservation. Since it was just 2 pm, we decided to cancel, and continue straight to our next destination – Las Vegas.

On our way we passed a town that seems the typical kind around here. It's called Puhrump, but should have been called Puh-dump. Middle of nowhere, lots of homes on a 1-acre lot each, but all mobile homes that look like s**t. Plus, they have nothing on their lots except cacti. Oh, and there are a couple of casinos of course.

Since our reservation for the Mirage is for tomorrow night, we decided to stay in some motel, so we checked in to a Motel 6, which is just two blocks from the strip.
We visited the Excalibur, Luxor, Tropicana and New York New York. All great. I love this city.
We "invested" $4 at the slot machines, and Noa won back $11.75!
Since we're investors, not gamblers, we took our winnings and didn't bet again.
We now have $6.75 in winnings to bet tomorrow. Maybe we'll try our hand at Blackjack. Wish us luck.