Armed with two cheeseburgers fries and a coffee I was heading into the Mojave Desert its about 10:30pm and the temp on the worlds tallest thermometer was 107 degrees. I had just pulled in from Tecopa where a hot wind blew me to Baker hoping to escape the incredible heat. (see previous post 09/07/21 Death Valley, 2021). My buddy who has been with me on this 5 day overland adventure called-it and drove himself home about 4 hours away. Me, I ventured into the Mojave Desert looking for a campsite I had camped at before. In the hot darkness I found my site and made camp behind a bluff to guard against the wind. It was about midnight when I finished eating my cheeseburgers and fries (funny they never got cold). Looking at the temp it was 94 degrees the wind had died down and the desert was cooling off. Tired from the days heat and a long hot dusty drive I was so ready to crash climbing into my RTT for the night.
In the morning I made coffee and went over my game plan for the day. I knew from this point that I could cross the rest of the Mojave in a day. I set out for the trail just behind the bluff I was camping at, my camp was off of KelBaker Rd just at
Seventeenmile Pt. I wasted no time and connected to Old Mojave Rd. soon I was passing
Little Cowhole Mt.
elev 1700. The scenery was arid, hot (
113 degrees), dusty and vast I saw no one. Keeping a sharp lookout for trail marking cairns as multiple trails crisscross and veer off the main trail.
I was approaching
Soda Dry Lake a iconic obstacle on the Old Mojave Trail Rd. Here you can go very wrong, stay on the trail do not very at all it could mean being bogged to your axles in a Salt Pan muck that's hiding under the dry harmless exterior crust. Once the Salt Pan's surface crust has been breached or compromised bogged is bogged, no tree to winch from
MaxTrax is your only slim hope running solo.
It is a tradition placing a rock that you have found on your travels and adding it to the travelers rock pile, at the half way point when crossing
Soda Dry Lake. What is also a tradition among travelers is that when you climb on the rock pile to place your rock, there is a message inscribed in stone deep within the pile, that you keep to yourself. (
Not telling!) "
You must make the journey yourself , if you want to know what is written", (Oh Grasshopper!!).
Busy keeping a keen eye out for trail markers, I follow the trail as it skirts
Malhausen Mountains. Navigating cautiously through the
Mojave River Wash, filled with soft sandy stretches, whoop-Di-doos wombat holes and deep eroded drop offs. Slow and steady as the sun was high in the sky with little or no shadows to define the contour of the trail. That's when I went from carefully negotiating a obstacle with deep rutted drop-offs to the other side, I never saw the series of moguls
(slamming on my brakes) that made my front end jump straight up and down violently
(3-times!). Luckily I was traveling extremely slow. Never the less it happened so fast that the whipping motion of my rig was enough to slide my
RTT forward about 3" on the roof rack,
( I was totally unaware of the RTT issue until I returned from this 5 day overlanding trip). I was so shaken that I just took stock of what went wrong inside the cab and never checked the exterior of my Rig before moving on. (
Nothing seemed wrong mechanically, so I think).
Continuing down through the
Mojave River Wash my next obstacle is
Afton Canyon and the famous
Afton River Water Crossing but first the trail takes you through the Mojave's past, old mines and old rail road spurs. Running on gravel along the current Rail system is pretty cool as the trail takes you through and around train track trestles.
I make my final approach to the river crossing and get out to see what has happened to the once very challenging epic water crossing, it's now a rocked bottom long puddle, Shame... (
courtesy of the Rail Road). Water crossings deep or not its still a gas to end your journey driving through moving water on one of the most historic and fought over desert trail crossings,
The Historic Old Mojave Trail Rd. Hope to see you on the Trail!!..
🚙......
Armed with two cheeseburgers fries and a coffee I was heading into the Mojave Desert its about 10:30pm and the temp on the worlds tallest thermometer was 107 degrees. I had just pulled in from Tecopa where a hot wind blew me to Baker hoping to escape the incredible heat. (see previous post 09/07/21 Death Valley, 2021). My buddy who has been with me on this 5 day overland adventure called-it and drove himself home about 4 hours away. Me, I ventured into the Mojave Desert looking for a campsite I had camped at before. In the hot darkness I found my site and made camp behind a bluff to guard against the wind. It was about midnight when I finished eating my cheeseburgers and fries (funny they never got cold). Looking at the temp it was 94 degrees the wind had died down and the desert was cooling off. Tired from the days heat and a long hot dusty drive I was so ready to crash climbing into my RTT for the night.
