Rocks, Sand, Wood. Death Valley National Park, California. December 12, 2013. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.
Colorful detritus of rocks, sand, and wood along the desert floor of Death Valley National Park
Death Valley National Park is landscape on the gigantic scale and a landscape of extremes. Elevations range from below sea level to over 11,000′ At the right time of year you can stand in 90 degree or hotter temperatures in the lowest place and look up to see snow on the highest peaks. It is well-known that the heat and aridity are extreme. The scale of the place is stupendous. When I first traveled in the park it reminded me, perhaps in a surprising way, of monumental landscapes that I had seen in The Yukon and Alaska, where the land seems to go on farther than one can see. Because there is so little vegetation, the geology of this desert landscape is laid bare, and rugged strata are easy to see.
But there are also surprises right underfoot. At the right time during the right years (and this photo was not made at such a time) small plants and wildflowers emerge and insects and other small critters can be seen. Some of these intimate landscape scenes seem more mundane, but they also tell stories worth hearing. This small patch of earth is at the base of some small, eroded hills along the east side of Death Valley where I have stopped from time to time. It is not an obviously special place – there is no parking lot or sign. The first time I went there to photograph in the evening I looked down and noticed the dense collection of multi-colored rocks, dead plants, and sand, and now when I go back there I seem to always end up looking for the same thing. The curving bit of dried wood was once a plant eking to a life at the edge of the main valley. These rocks are likely evidence of the surprising role that water plays in the formation of this landscape, having been washed down from those various strata and formation high in the Amargosa Range, leaving traces of blue, pink, purple, tan, and green minerals. And below and mixed in with all of this is the omnipresent sand, deposited and moved to and fro by Valley winds.
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.