DEATH VALLEY'S BADWATER BASIN: THE SALT OF THE EARTH

I hit an all-time low two weeks ago while visiting the salt flats of California's Death Valley; sodium chloride will do that for you, particularly in the heat of the moment.

The heat of the moment was officially 116 F degrees. Wowza!

Actually, the aforementioned moment isn’t entirely true, at least on a global scale. Check this link for details.  Let’s just say, if we’re talking North America, I can stick to my story.  With tongue in cheek (except for Miley Cyrus, isn’t that where most of us keep our tongues, anyway?), I’m here to report that Death Valley’s Badwater Basin, specifically the infamous salt flats of this endorheic basin (geological speak for a closed drainage basin that retains water and allows no outflow to other external bodies of water), sits 282 feet below sea level – the lowest point in North America.   Get it?  I hit an all-time low!   Okay; guess you had to be there. 

I have several pictures attesting to Badwater Basin’s claim to fame.   That’s my brother Chris holding up the sign at Death Valley’s number one visitor attraction. Hey, it's government work; he likes it!    

A million visitors annually undoubtedly have a similar picture of their time spent at this hot spot.

You’ll probably have to take me at my word when it comes to the next picture. About half-way up the middle of the mountain in the background is a teeny tiny blue blob of a sign that says SEA LEVEL.  Apparently, if the Pacific Ocean just happened to find its way to this dry desert, it would basically level off at that blue blob, 282 feet up the side of the Amargosa Mountain Range.   

Get that magnifying glass out. I could barely see the sign, and I was there.

Okay, maybe this closeup will help.   

See the level?

And speaking of sea level, years and years ago this very basin was at the bottom of – no, not the sea – a lake; in fact, we’re talking several endorheic lakes (my new word of the day).     

Today’s Badwater Basin, all 8,000 feet of gravel, sand, and mud, attests to geologists’ theories regarding the key role those lakes played in creating this natural wonder.  

The is beauty at its barest.

Runoff during rainfall in the surrounding mountain ranges (a drainage system of 9,000 square miles) collected salts and other minerals on its way down the mountains before settling at the bottom of what came to be called Lake Manly, after an American pioneer, guide and author who helped in the rescue of fellow '49ers lost in Death Valley.  Those salts from the runoff concentrated in the lowest portions of the lakebed.

My son Ryan led the way during our trek onto the salt flats.

Lake Manly was, of course, little more than silt with pockets of white, crusty sheets of sodium the day we visited.  As the sun beat down on those bright salt flats, it bounced right back up, the intense rays concentrating in a thick blanket of hot air that was as blinding as it was oppressive.  I managed two or three minutes on the thin sheet of crystals glittering in the sun before the heat drove me back to the boardwalk.  

Step off the boardwalk and you're likely to sink a few inches in mud.

I was disappointed to find no evidence of the mysterious honeycombed-patterned cracks in the salt pan for which Death Valley is so famous, at least according to beautiful photographs I've seen by those luckier than myself.      

Wikipedia file, courtesy of Dave Toussaint.

Apparently flooding is part of the equation, those rare occasions (typically once every thousand years or so) when water stirs up the salt deposits, dissolving many of the surface crystals.  The last flood occurred in 2005, when six inches of rain fell in Death Valley as compared to the typical 1.5 inch annual rainfall; but back to the honeycombs. 

As the water evaporates, it leaves behind fresh, re-crystalized salts atop the slurry of mud in a honeycombed pattern.  As a former geometry teacher, I’m here to attest, this is Mother Nature at her finest and most efficient.   The 120 degree angles in a regular hexagon allow for maximum volume with minimum surface area, i.e. the most energy-efficient formation for a given shape.  I tend to agree with Galileo.  The astronomer, mathematician, and philosopher concluded, “Mathematics is the alphabet with which God wrote the universe.”   Amen.

The day of my visit, I concluded that mankind had intervened, tromping any and all evidence of honeycombs since the last significant rainfall.  There was evidence of a small pool of water, apparently the catalyst for the name, Badwater Basin.  As the story goes, one of the first prospectors to arrive in Death Valley dubbed the permanent source of fresh water "bad water" when his donkey refused to drink the briny liquid.  

Jimmy pondering the latest puddle particulars; perhaps the pupfish, indigenous to Death Valley.

Yes, the water is fresh when it bubbles up from the aquifer below Death Valley, the same flow system that also provides water for many regions outside Death Valley; but the surrounding sodium left in the lakebed over thousands and thousands of years of deposits is quickly absorbed into the water, making it much too salty for consumption.

That same puddle is the designated lowest point in the Valley (remember? 282 feet below sea level), although actually, that distinction lies somewhere out there in the salt flats, where few were inclined to wander.   

The salt flats cover nearly 200 square miles throughout Death Valley.

I wandered back to the car, the sunshine blinding, the heat unbearable, my curiosity sated; but not before capturing a picture with my own honey comb.     

As far as I'm concerned, my guy is truly the salt of the earth.