Death Valley's expanse to Ash Meadows' pools

Looking south through Death Valley

Pupfish in Kings Pool

A morning trip into Death Valley National Park became unavoidable. But other treasures of the Mohave Desert proved just as spectacular.  

Initially I had no plans to revisit after an epic day from January 2011 took Ben, Jeff, and myself through the park. 

Near Golden Canyon

We took our time and hit all the highlights. Dante’s View and Golden Canyon gave us tremendous views. We visited the rocks at Zabriskie Point and along the Artist’s Point drive. Thanks to torrential January rains, we stood at the edge of an ephemeral lake at Badwater Basin, the lowest natural point in the U.S. We bonded with some surprisingly tame coyotes at the south exit to the park. 

How could I top that? I didn’t even try. But when staying less than two hours from Death Valley, I couldn't rationalize skipping it.  

This trek to Death Valley came due to closeness - Desert National Wildlife Refuge was less than two hours away and the route bypassed Pahrump, passing no towns of any size. 

The drive into Death Valley was still entrancing. Plenty of roadside wildflowers bloomed. The leadup into Death Valley is the Amargosa Valley, which offers its share of stunning vistas. There was no temporary lake this April, although there had been enough water earlier in 2026 for the park service to issue warnings that launching any boat or kayak in the Badwater Basin area was illegal. Mostly I enjoyed seeing the famous Furnace Creek temperature gauge at 70. 

Golden Canyon

No Sand People

No jawas

Wherever I could, I tried to soak in the atmosphere. Soak might be the wrong word in such an arid place, but Death Valley feels otherworldly. If you know there to look, Death Valley presents very familiar alien worlds. 

I hiked in Golden Canyon, this time knowledgeable about its role in the original Star Wars. Here the Jawas stalked the lost R2D2, eventually immobilizing him with a stun gun and hauling him to their Sandcrawler. The slots along the canyon walls provided hiding spots. It was used in a later Tatooine sequence where Luke and C-3PO find R2 after he wanders off to find Obi-Wan. 

Hearty purple flowers

In a hike through the Golden Canyon, it is not difficult to see what appeared into the film. Not a single Jawa could be seen, but they are good at hiding. 

I hoped some of the winter/spring superbloom remained in Death Valley, although most plants had gone to seed already. 

Those that flowered were mostly hardier desert plants a few inches tall but built to withstand the brutal summer heat striking Death Valley. Despite its massive size, Death Valley did not compare to the day’s second stop, the largest cluster of natural springs in the Mohave Desert. 

Just past the California-Nevada border and the obligatory hotel-casino from another era, a little brown sign marked the dirt roads of Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge. Had my friend not alerted me, I would have sped past. 

Ash Meadows was off my radar during the 2011 trip through the Amargosa Valley. After learning about its rare treasures, Ash Meadows could not be skipped. 

Ash Meadows covers 23,000 acres of alkaline desert and numerous natural springs. It protects more than two dozen plant and animal species found nowhere else. Among the animals, most are small – insects and fish – but it’s a rare level of biodiversity and endemic species. 

For all its stunning contrast with the dry surrounding desert, Ash Meadows almost went condo. In the early 1980s, developers were already clearing land for houses that would herald the end of the local springs. 

Fortunately, nonprofit conservation groups bought the site and conveyed it to the federal government, creating the national wildlife refuge. 

The refuge also includes the Longstreet cabin, a stone structure built by Old West figure James Longstreet, and its neighboring spring. A house next to a natural water supply allowed people to live quiet well in this scorching desert. 

The first glimpse of Ash Meadows majesty comes at Crystal Spring. A boardwalk loop behind the visitor center travels a one-mile route through salt flats to Crystal Spring, which takes you past the stream running from Crystal Spring. 

Reeds cover the spring, making it virtually impossible to spot the rare pupfish that inhabit those waters. That thin ribbon gives life to the desert with a gentle roll of water, but its reed-covered waters cannot prepare you for the natural beauty of Crystal Spring. 

Upon seeing the majestic blue waters of Crystal Spring, I can’t imagine how anyone could see this as a place for development. I have always tended to side with nature instead of profits at any cost. But there’s a purity to the water in such an inhospitable place that I could not shake. 

Devil's Hole lies somewhere up there

Crystal Spring is notably smaller than a century ago, as some of its waters funnel to the Crystal Reservoir, which allows swimming and kayaking. But the water keeps flowing out at 2,800 gallons a minute. They call it fossil water because it likely fell on the Mohave Desert many thousands of years ago only to resurface with the desert drier than ever. 

Within Ash Meadows boundaries lies Devil’s Hole, a detached unit of Death Valley, a uniquely deep pool with 90-degree ancient water, an unknown depth, and the ability to register waves when earthquakes occur thousands of miles of away. It has a unique resident in the Devil’s Hole pupfish, which exists only in the pool and is critically endangered. 

Due to past trespassers, the overlook of Devil’s Hole has heavy restrictions and does not provide the best views, especially for translucent fish less than an inch long. Although I was tempted, the rough road to Devil’s Hole and limited visibility led me elsewhere. 

Fortunately, Ash Meadows has much better viewing spots for rare pupfish found only in its pools. The desert plants around Crystal Spring make fish viewing difficult, but they reveal themselves readily in the springs in Kings Pool at Point of Rock Springs. Surrounded by mesquite trees and many bird species, a short boardwalk runs through this collection of springs.

Point of Rock area

King Pool at Point of Rock

Pupfish habitat

From a hilltop above Point of Rocks, viewing scopes under a canopy allow visitors to scan the Devils Hole Hills for desert bighorn sheep. I didn’t see any, but the pupfish are the chief attraction here. 

The pupfish are tiny, barely visible but they come in a variety of colors including green and deep blue. I watched them far longer than I expected as the sunlight caught their scales and occasional stiff winds blurred the King Pool’s surface. 

North of Desert NWR and east of Death Valley lies the infamous Area 51, the supposed holding area for UFOs. As a top-secret military installation, Area 51 has no actual visitor center, but a few businesses around the region snapped up that mantel. 

Amargosa Valley is not much more than a rest area and a few gas stations, including the so-called Area 51 visitor center, a giant tourist trap with scores of T-shirts and other alien-related souvenirs. Next to the visitor center Alien Cathouse, a strip club that never closes. 

I doubt anything extraterrestrial was in a hurry to beam down there. If alien visitors travelled as far as the Death Valley region, hopefully they would have the sense to spend their time at the rare springs at Ash Meadows.

The unforgettable pupfosh

Friend of the Desert

Approaching Corn Creek below the Sheep Range

After hustling through Albuquerque with no traffic and a full moon descending, I was not prepared for Las Vegas rush hour. A typical 4-6 evening rush hour felt unlikely, but traffic crawled through town. 

Before I dove into the stream of cars, I stopped off at the Lake Mead overlook, where the bathtub ring of past shorelines and dry bays dominated one of the West's most critical water sources. I walked in the small desert gardens around the visitor center to stretch my legs after having barely left the car since Ash Fork, Arizona.  

Lake Mead

Occasional glimpses of the Strip were as close as I got to gambling. After an hour of grinding along, all the cars vanished, as did the Vegas sprawl. 

I crossed an Indian reservation boundary, then turned toward an isolated path of green in a broad valley hemmed by brown, craggy mountains. Only a simple sign indicated I headed in the right direction, while other signs urged me to drive like a tortoise. that gave me hope I might run into an endangered desert tortoise (I didn't).

The Desert National Wildlife Refuge preserves the green patch, the mountains, and everything between, forming the largest national wildlife refuge in the Lower 48. Its 1.5 million acres cover dusty roads, recluse cabins, bristlecone pines at its highest elevations, and everything east to Pahranagat National Wildlife Refuge. To the east, the striped mountains of the Sheep Range offer visitor s a glimpse back in time, those belts of rock developed in past geologic eras. 

Beyond Corn Creek, the backcountry roads are strictly for high-clearance, 4-wheel-drive vehicles. One can journey 70 miles without sight of civilization. Sometimes even those primitive roads are impassable. The desert bighorn sheep protected by the refuge rarely appear near Corn Creek, sticking to the mountains and often living off water sources there (water is flown to backcountry bins during dry years). The refuge headquarters its share of delights. 

The visitor center stands adjacent to Corn Creek, the rush of spring water that makes life in this desert possible. Several trails run through the oasis. Birds, lizards, snakes, and more resided here. I didn’t see a desert tortoise, but they have been known to amble through, as have coyotes. Standing in such an arid place and hearing the healthy gurgle of Corn Creek just gives me a little hope in this world. 

After all, this place survives against the odds. Protection has kept the water running, as development has sapped the waters of springs around the southwest, the best known being the springs around which the original Las Vegas settlement formed (they ran dry in 1960). The reeds, mesquite and other trees brought surprises around each corner. 

Corn Creek contains Pahrump poolfish, a tiny species of critically endangered fish who could no longer survive in its native springs due to the introduction of goldfish. They thrive in Corn Creek, which has pushed them back from extinction. In one slower stretch along the creek, they numbered in the dozens. 

An onsite refugium provides tanks to poolfish populations before they are reintroduced to the wild. Even in a safe place, the poolfish face threats The refuge must be vigilant against people dumping goldfish – how this is a thing, I’ll never understand. But people do it, and goldfish could quickly wipe out the Pahrump poolfish. The refuge also maintains a small reservoir pool to keep introduced crayfish from entering the creek, as crayfish are difficult to remove once introduced and prey upon poolfish. 

Railroad tie cabin, early 1900s

Before it became a refuge, a family homesteaded the property. Evidence of the Richardson family’s years on the land runs strong. The cabin they built from railroad ties from the failed Las Vegas-Tonopah Railroad still stands and looks livable after a renovation. 

The family’s bigger impact lies in what they brought with them - they planted fruit trees, including pomegranates, that still produce fruit. 

Pomegranate blossoms

The pomegranate trees were orange with orange blossoms in early April. The native plants grow tall along Corn Creek, a sharp break from the sage and Joshua trees that dominate the refuge’s lower elevations. Prickly pear cacti popped with brilliant pink flowers across the Corn Creek area. 

After a recent heat spell, the surprises did not include any snakes although lizards were plentiful.

This week, temperatures settled in the 70s but quickly plummeted to the low 40s after sunset. The cold was refreshing so long as I wore enough layers. One night the wind rushed all night, the other was still. Both were cold, I woke up recharged from sleeping in such a peaceful place. 

Visitor center pond

The modern visitor center also served as a break from heavy driving. My friend served as a volunteer and artist-in-residence. On Fridays she hosts a watercolor journaling workshop. We looked out onto the Corn Creek oasis, then drew and painted. I sat in front of the desert plants and trees, although my painting a crystal spring at their bases that doesn’t exist. The creek runs there, but the foliage is too dense to see the water there. 

Visitors came and went through the day until its sunset closing. A family from Illinois came to see the place they walked regularly when they lived in Vegas. Young lovers found a bench from where they planned to watch the sunset. 

Full moon, Vegas haze

The only influence of the Las Vegas everyone knows was the light pollution along the southern horizon. The dark skies still popped with stars and the Milky Way glow, at least until the full moon rose from the southeast. By morning the moon began its steady descent over the western mountains. Once first light broke, the birds began to pipe up. 

Each morning, I woke, then raced out to enjoy the calm moments before sunrise. On the last day, the sun emerged a little too fast, as I wanted to keep the chill in my bones along Corn Creek as long as I could. But it would fade as the oasis came to life in bird song.

Nothern Arizona: The ancient and unexpected

Humphreys Peak near Flagstaff

Every morning of this spring 2026 western swing, I seemed to chase the full or mostly full moon to the western horizon. 

First, I had to drive through a pummeling rain. The skies opened over Glorieta Pass and poured till Santa Fe. Spring rains have their perks in the desert, as creosote and a rich petrichor scented the Santa Fe twilight. Beyond a green chile cheeseburger, I didn’t demand much of adobe-clad Santa Fe this night, just a five-hour headstart on a sprint toward Las Vegas. The earthy, herbal tones stayed rich into the early hours. 

Smells only went so far. Interstate 40 wears on drivers, thanks to its near-endless stream of semis. Funneling cargo from the Port of Los Angeles to the rest of the country, the road frequently turns into a wall of trucks. 

Elevation shifts I-40 in Arizona from high desert into more montane ecosystem past Flagstaff, with pine forests and small towns. 

When the highway essentially turns into rubble near the Las Vegas turnoff at Kingman, Arizona, one cannot say farewell to the infernal road fast enough. The best of Kingman was Andy Devine Avenue, named for the character actor from westerns including Stagecoach and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, who hailed from the northwest Arizona town. Kingman was the last Arizona town of the trip (plus the many barren miles toward Hoover Dam), but many stops preceded that turn. 

After Holbrook, distance gets measured less by mileage and more by proximity to Humphreys Peak, the tallest mountain in Arizona and heart of the San Francisco Peaks, largest of the region’s dormant volcano. Its snowy heights gleamed from more than 100 miles away. Before an eruption 400,000-plus years ago, Humphreys Peak might have ranged up to 16,000 feet high. 

At Winslow I made a brief stop for coffee and to see the street corner. GPS almost took me back of out town, as Winslow’s main business district is laid out on two one-way streets. In the coffee shop across from the street corner, the clerk let me look at the Diebold bank vault near the counter. I found that just as interesting as the monument to the Eagles. 

Winslow’s other famous tourist stop was easier to pass. The famous meteor crater seen in the movie Starman lies outside of town – old advice from a friend once again filled me ears - “They charge you $30 to look at a hole in the ground.” 

Despite the nearness of Arizona’s signature natural feature, my plans focused on northern Arizona’s lesser-known National Park Service sites. I would save the Grand Canyon to enjoy with someone. The smaller monuments were more my speed on this trip. 

The Flagstaff area served up a trio of related national monuments – Walnut Canyon, Sunset Crater Volcano, and Wupatki. 

Main settlement above Walnut Canyon

 

Walnut Canyon walls

In retrospect, I would have started with Wupatki and finished with Walnut Canyon. The dramatic, innovative community citadel built into the rise above Walnut Canyon had few rivals. The road takes you to a visitor center that gives up no secrets. The trail to the cliff dwellings descends from there on a series of stairs. A second, steeper trail travels to the canyon bottom, and I didn't have time for that. 

The main collection of dwellings sits on an outcrop above Walnut Canyon. These ancestral peoples carved their homes from the cliff walls, creating a village almost impervious to attack. Other dwellings were carved from the canyon walls. In the main village area, some dwellings were accessible to visitors. 

 The Sinagua people (Spanish for “without water” owing to the dry region) occupied Walnut Canyon for about a century more than 800 years ago before migrating out. They farmed above the canyon and hunted game below their settlement while trading with both local and far-flung tribes. 

The steep hike to the dwellings was worth the time, as the morning sun demonstrated why its former residents build the homes where they did. It’s an ingenious way to settle a difficult place, even if it just thrived for a short time. 

A short drive along the eastern edge of Flagstaff brought me to Sunset Crater Volcano. Despite my expectation that it would be a relatively similar experience to Capulin Volcano and the northern New Mexico field of extinct cones. 

Sunset Crater and its nearby volcanoes are relatively young and considered dormant, but not extinct. Sunrise last erupted 1,000 years ago, which the nearby peoples would have witnessed and had their lives upturned. 

Sunset Crater

 The people settled around the volcano were forced to flee, although it had an unexpected benefit for the Wupatki people in the volcanic ash enriching the local soils. The ponderosa pines run tall here, with large groves that frequently blocks of Sunset Crater. Unlike Capulin, no trails access the Sunset Crater or its cone. While not expected to erupt again, the volcano field feels more akin to the formations and black rock of Craters of the Moon in Idaho. 

Even at 1,000 years old, the lava flows feel contemporary. Wildflowers grow from the dark soils and lava formations. Few people journeyed past the national monument eastern boundary, where a scenic drive connects to Wupatki National Monument via Coconino National Forest. I expected the same crowds I saw at the visitor center but had the scenic drive to myself until the Wupatki border. 

Leaving the volcanic field, the road soon crests and reveals unexpected views of the Painted Desert. I had no idea it was so vast, but the desert runs across Navajo Country from northwest from Petrified Forest from the eastern edge of the Grand Canyon. I sat for a while and watched its quiet expanse. 

Coming to Wupatki, I saw a visitor center up the road but a much older structure to my north. I aimed there first. Set upon a patch of flat rocks, the rust-colored Wukoki Pueblo rises from the plain. 

Wukoki Pueblo

The Wupatki Pueblo, the monument’s largest, is built in the same red style as Wukoki and stands behind the visitor center. Other pueblos sit further out, including the Lomaki and Box Canyon residences that sit on the ledge of a canyon. A crossroads for millennia, Wupatki has reveal ample evidence of trade, including shell necklaces and the skeletal remains of a macaw, which is native to Mexico. 

While the culture that built the pueblos dates back 800-1,000 years, the region’s role as a crossroads goes back 13,000 years. Only when overfarming drained the soil of nutrients did the Wupatki culture move on.  

Wuptaki Pueblo

Below Humphreys Peak and serving as the Grand Canyon’s gateway, Flagstaff has remained the same crossroads as the region was for its Native residents. I was glad to see the Native role in shaping the region is so integral to its character. The ancient settlements and slumbering volcanoes combined to provide a 1,000-year view of changes in Arizona’s north country. 

While this was my first time near Flagstaff in 22 years, the crossroads of northern Arizona seems a place worth landing again. 

Humphreys Peak from the north. 

Denver Days: Zoo after the snow

 

Not Bodhi. 

I failed at my one goal when visiting the Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance - I wanted to see Bodhi. 

The mid-2000s star of the Columbus Zoo & Aquarium’s Asian elephant exhibit lives at the Denver Zoo in City Park. 

Not Bodhi. 

The 300-pound sausage who hid under his mother was now the tallest of the six male Asian elephants in Denver, owing to his long legs. His mother, Phoebe, still lives at Columbus, and had a female calf in 2025 at age 38. 

As for Bodhi, he was off-exhibit this Saturday as the other male elephants grazed in the massive elephant enclosure. “You might be able to see him if you look down that way,” one zoo staffer told me. But I couldn’t. There would be no Bodhi for me. While I got over missing Bodhi, pretty much everything else at the Denver Zoo was enjoyable and up to the standards of a big-city zoo. 

The boys

Bodhi has quite a life at 5,280 feet of elevation. Elephant Passage is rated among the best zoo exhibits nationwide. The six male elephants range 11 years old to 56-year-old Groucho, who gets daily cognitive challenges to keep his mind sharp (he has outlived the average age for Asian elephants). 

The Elephant Passage contains three areas reminiscent of different southeast Asian environments - The Chang Pa Wildlife Preserve, The Schoelzel Family Village and the Village Outpost - and two miles of trails spread across 10 acres. 

The boys get a choice between multiple enclosures each day. The keepers have developed a system of symbols for each elephant and one (usually Bodhi) gets to decide who joins them in which yard. They have access to multiple ponds and mud wallows for enrichment. That way, they can be outside but not crowded, and the exhibits also house greater one-horned rhinos and Malayan tapirs at different times. 

Situated in City Park east of downtown, the zoo was an early pioneer in natural exhibits. Dating back a century, the zoo moved away from the concrete and bars to settings that stressed the animals less. Bear Mountain, the original natural exhibit, still operates, although the bears were deep in winter slumber. 

Denver received a heavy, wet snow the previous day, but a 50-degree Saturday seemed perfect for the zoo. The penguins thrived in this weather, and dove for fish rewards. 

The African building with the lion blind has space for the West African dwarf crocodile, who was content to chill in its heated water and let the world go by. 

The male lions greeted everyone with their roars. We didn’t get to the portion of the exhibit with the four cubs born in 2025, but a zoo docent told me they are pushing 75 pounds and not the blue-eyed cubs everyone hopes to see. 

The two species of bighorn sheep – desert and mountain -did not mind the elements., finding sunny spots to rest. The African penguins came out for their twice-daily show, eager for the small fish that came with their appearance. 

Most of the apes, monkeys, lemurs, and other primates moved to indoor enclosures until warmer days. Several nocturnal primates received exhibits with low-lights. The orangutans did venture out for some vegetable snacks. 

A keeper discussed the gorillas as they milled around the indoor enclosure. A male gorilla stormed up to the glass where my friend stood. His speed was frightening for his size, but we agreed he was probably more of a gentleman than much of the Colorado dating pool. 

For Australia, the zoo’s kangaroos and wallabies share a large yard, which allows visitors to get close to the gentle marsupials. One kangaroo made an immediate impression – with her white fur, pink nose and eyes, I knew the zoo had a rare albino kangaroo. 

But how did the harsher UV rays impact such a sun-sensitive marsupial? This seemed like a bad climate for any creature with a sun sensitivity. A zookeeper told me she had been trained to apply sun block to her nose, the most vulnerable spot. Hard not to enjoy when a zoo has a good answer for a potential animal hazard. 

The giraffes huddled indoors, their building tall enough for their stature but the one exhibit that felt a little dated. To be fair, with the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo known for his 15-head giraffe herd, it would have felt small no matter what. 

Tropical Discovery covers amphibians, reptiles and serves as the zoo’s aquarium. The amphibian exhibit displayed a worldwide range of frogs and toads of all sizes and colors. Many rare frog species caught my eye, including the Titicaca frogs. They sat underwater and seem undisturbed by the activity around them. 

Two intimidating Komodo dragons sat motionless in their enclosures. Part of a captive breeding/species survival program, they looked stately but as though they could spring to motion and haul down prey. The famously don't have to do more than bite and track - their neurotoxins and anticoagulant saliva slow down their prey.

DZCA finished a renovation of its seal exhibit in 2025, with the deep pool surrounded by a wharf-inspired setting. The seals seemed just fine with the new digs. 

The Denver Zoo acquitted itself quite well, from the elephant and lion displays to little nooks for thumb-sized frogs. The big urban zoo moves by at a leisurely pace, as gentle as the grazing horses and buffalo.

Titicaca frogs

Amphibian wealth

Take the picture already.