Death Valley National Park: Valentine’s Day
Choosing a Valentine’s Day gift is always a bit of a hit-or-miss proposition. I’m proud to say I’ve never given my wife a fishing rod or bait bucket for the most romantic day of the year. But once, I thought it was a good idea to give her a portable toilet. Not just any portable toilet, though. This one came with a pop-up privacy tent.
That February, we were heading out on a camping trip to Joshua Tree and Death Valley, and I thought, what better way to signal my undying love than the gift of being able to go anywhere, anytime?
Below is an excerpt from our fourth book, Dear Bob and Sue: Season 3. This email is from that particular Valentine’s Day.
~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~
From: Matt Smith
Subject: Happy Valentine’s Day!
Date: February 14, 2018
Dear Bob and Sue,
Here’s a tip that I’ve learned from almost 36 years of marriage: spouses love it when there’s a theme to the gifts you give them on a special day like today.
This year, I chose personal hygiene and bodily functions. I know, I know, that’s two themes, but I tend to overdo it on special occasions. In addition to the portable toilet, I bought Karen especially for this trip, I also got her a spa day.
The ranger at the campground told me that for five bucks each we could get a one-day membership to the pool at Furnace Creek Ranch Resort, which is adjacent to the campground.
The membership includes shower privileges, so this morning I surprised Karen with her very own one-day membership. She was able to luxuriate in a hot shower for the first time since leaving Henderson. Yep, the romance is still smoking after all these years.
There wasn’t a cloud in the sky this morning, and despite the cold temperature, the sun warmed us quickly as we walked back to our campsite from the pool. By 9:00 a.m. we were fresh as daisies and ready to start our day.
I’m not sure if it was the showers, or that we finally got accustomed to living out of the teardrop, but we were both in great moods as we sat in our camp chairs drinking our second cups of coffee.
Nothing was going to bring us down, not even the parade of RVs visiting the dump site across the road from where we were sitting. We had a front row seat.
Since we have experience with “dumping” an RV, we considered ourselves experts, which meant we felt qualified to provide color commentary on the RVers’ performances.
“This guy is a pro,” I said to Karen. “He opened the hatch and connected the waste hose with one smooth motion.”
“Yeah, he knows his way around a glory hole for sure, but I have to deduct points for not wearing safety glasses,” she replied.
“Sweetie, this is the big leagues; he doesn’t need safety glasses. And did you see that no-look black-water valve shutoff? This is like watching a NASCAR pit stop. I’m giving him a 9.9.”
“I’m going with 9.7. He was good, but one-tenth off for no safety glasses and another tenth for that little hesitation before pulling away from the station. I think he double-clutched before putting it into gear.”
“Wow, the Russian judge comes in with a 9.7; that’s still going to be a hard score to beat.”
“Uh, oh. This next one looks like trouble; it’s a Cruise America unit,” Karen said.
“Whoa! That’s an automatic full-point deduction for letting the kids play around the dump hole!”
“Oh my God! They’re dancing around it. I can’t watch,” Karen said.
“No, no, no, he’s trying to fill his fresh water tank with the spray hose that’s supposed to be for cleaning around the dump hole! I’ll have to check the rule book; that may be an automatic disqualification.”
“Matt, you have to go help him.”
“I’m a judge. I’m not allowed to help. Besides, he just figured it out; he’s using the correct hose now.”
“But his kids are still dicking around the hole. They might fall in.”
“Fall in? Have you ever seen a dump hole? Oh, that’s right, you haven’t ever been within a hundred yards of one. It’s a six-inch hole. The worst thing that can happen is one of them gets a foot caught, maybe a leg. They’ll be fine.”
“The Russian judge is turning her chair so she can’t see the dump station,” Karen said.
“Good idea. I think I’ll join you; no one’s going to beat that first guy. He was the Michael Jordan of dumpers.”
By mid-morning, we’d made sandwiches and loaded our daypacks; it was time to see the park. Our first stop was Badwater Basin, the lowest point of elevation in North America at 282 feet below sea level.
Salt crystals grow out of the cracks of the dry basin floor forming delicate white lines. We walked onto the floor of the basin and Karen spent a half an hour taking pictures of the salt patterns.
“Look at this one,” she said as she showed me her phone.
“That’s, nice, Sweetie.”
“Do you see what it is?” she asked.
“A potato?” I replied.
“No! It’s a heart, you know, because it’s Valentine’s Day.”
“Oh, yeah, a heart. I see it.”
“You’re looking at it upside down.”
“OK, now I see it. It’s an upside-down heart. Got it.”
“No. It’s right-side-up now. Never mind. Happy Valentine’s Day,” she said.
“More like Happy Potato Day,” I muttered under my breath.
After Badwater, we drove back toward Furnace Creek and parked at the Golden Canyon trailhead parking lot on the east side of Badwater Road. From there, we had a couple of trails to choose from. We decided to hike south toward Gower Gulch. That trail hugs the hillside out in the open for about three-quarters of a mile before turning east and following a narrow canyon toward Zabriskie Point.
Three miles into our hike (about a half a mile before Zabriskie Point), we turned west on the Badlands Loop trail, which took us back in the direction of Golden Canyon where we’d parked. The entire loop turned out to be around five and a half miles.
For most of the time, we felt like we were the only ones on the trail; we seldom saw other hikers. The landscape around the Badlands Loop was bizarre and beautiful at the same time; vegetation was almost non-existent, and the hills were a subtle rainbow of colors. It’s one of the things we love about the national parks: you can be a couple of miles from the parking lot and still feel like you’re in the middle of nowhere.
When we got to within a mile of the parking lot, we turned left (west) onto the Golden Canyon trail. Even though the map assured us that we didn’t have far to go, we were getting concerned about how much water we had left. We’d been in full sun for most of the hike, and our supply was getting low.
Ironically, as we were taking a break to inventory our water, a group of four hikers, two women and two men, approached us to ask directions. They were dressed more appropriately for lunch at a nice restaurant than for a hike in the desert.
“How much farther is it?” one of them asked.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “How much farther is what?”
“How much farther is the hike?”
Their English wasn’t great, and I was concerned they might misunderstand me if I tried to explain that there were many trails and loops ahead of them, so I merely said, “Much further.”
“OK, thank you,” they replied, and started hiking toward Zabriskie Point.
“Wait. How much water do you have?” I asked. None of them was wearing a backpack, and only one was holding a water bottle.
The man with the water bottle held it up and said, “Thank you.”
“No. You need more water than that,” I said.
“We’ll be fine,” he replied with a big smile.
“You don’t want to hike much further with only that amount of water,” I said shaking my head.
“Thank you,” was his reply.
I turned to Karen and asked, “Should we just let them go?”
“We can’t make them stop, and we don’t have any water left to give them. I don’t think there’s anything else we can do.”
On our last mile back to the truck, we passed at least a dozen groups of hikers also heading toward Zabriskie Point, which made us feel reassured that the group we had just met wouldn’t be alone on the trail if their lack of water became a real problem.
After a snack back at the teardrop, we drove to the Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes and did the same thing we do every trip to Death Valley; we hiked to a high spot on the dunes to watch the sunset. From our perch we could hardly see any other people, and it was easy to imagine we had the place to ourselves as we watched the sun sink behind the Panamint Range.
Thinking back on all of the Valentine’s Days we’ve spent together, 38 in total since we started dating in college, I had to laugh at how much time we’d both spent over the years trying to think of the “perfect” gifts to get each other.
I can speak for both of us when I say that all of those presents and cards and chocolates mean nothing compared to just spending time together, even if all we do is sit on a large pile of sand in the middle of the desert. (OK, maybe Karen would trade a few moments with me for a box of sea salt caramels covered in dark chocolate, but you get my point.)
The sun went behind the mountains— there was no green flash tonight—and we began our trek back to the parking lot. Trudging through the sand, it didn’t feel much easier going down the slopes than it was hiking up. About halfway to the truck, I was fifty feet ahead of Karen when I began shuffling my feet as I crossed a small dune.
“Why are you walking in that direction?” Karen asked. “The truck is this way.”
“Wait right there,” I called back to her as I continued to shuffle across the smooth hill.
“Uh, it’s beer time. I’ll meet you back at the truck,” she said.
“Close your eyes,” I said. “I have something for you.” When I was finished, I stood at the top of the hill and held my arms out. “You can look now.”
She stared at the shape my footprints made in the sand. As if according to some master plan, the dunes and the mountains had taken on a pinkish cast in the twilight. “Since you didn’t find your heart at Badwater Basin this morning, I made one for you,” I told her. She held her hands to her face.
I came down the hill, and we hugged for a long moment.
“Are you crying?” I asked.
“No, I must have gotten some sand in my eyes.” She wiped them with the back of her hand. “It’s very romantic,” she said shaking her head.
I have to admit that I’m never going to understand my wife. I buy her a top-of-the-line, outdoor toilet with an extra supply of disposable bags and she barely acknowledges it, but I spend thirty seconds stomping out a heart in the sand and she gets all weepy.
After she had taken photos of the heart from every conceivable angle, I moved on to the top of the next dune hoping that would encourage her to wrap up the photo shoot. “I think you got it, Sweetie,” I hollered.
“Just a few more,” she replied.
“Uh, it’s beer time, I’ll meet you back at the truck.” Enough of the romance; it was beer time.
Best Valentine’s Day ever.
Your friend,
Matt
