Bishop to Vegas

The drive today takes us from Bishop to Vegas with stops on Mount Whitney, death valley and furnace creek.

Mount Whitney is the tallest peak in continental US at 14,000+ feet and Death Valley is the lowest at -300 feet. A lot of downhill to travel.

We only had a few hours at Whitney so we climbed the first section to the Whitney Portal. What a spectacular climb. It's recommended that hikers spend 2 days in the base camp acclimatizing before they take the final 2 day hike to the top and back. Jon really got into the climb and was disappointed that we had to cut it short. (note to self, plan a mountain hike with Jon - and let him carry the heavy pack)

The drive to death valley is very different from the tahoe region. the peaks are not as high and the passes are more gradual. I guess these are older mountains and the roads spend more time in the alluvial plains.

We followed a pattern: climb up and down a range with a few zig zag roads and then race down an 8% down hill straight road into a valley with a straight line dash across and climb up the mirror image to the next side. On the way down, the car is accelerating with heavy braking to make the hairpin turns. In the 8% straights, the car acceerates quickly to 70 plus mph. Hit the brakes hard to slow down to 50 and then coast up to 70. no gas, just coast. The car doesn't use a lot of gas, but the brakes get a real work out. Our car has partially melted plastic wheel covers.

The climb up is the opposite. the car kicks down to a low gear and revs up at 4000 rpm constant climb speed. any gas saved in the down hill gets burned during the uphill.

Shortly after Whitney, it started to get over 100F. As we desended into the valleys, the heat started to riste into the 107 - 110 range. In the hills the temperature dropped 5.5 degrees every 1,000 feet increase in temperature.

Death Valley was 118. At the Furnace Creek museum, it was 120. It's a dry heat that feels very different than Toronto, but with 1.5% moisture, it sucks the water out of you. The windows in the car almost burn your hand if you touch them. The museum has a display that shows why it gets so hot. The valley behaves like a convection oven.

We did a mad dash to vegas and got there earlier than expected. The high speed straight highways makes a big difference.