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After our visit to Yosemite National Park, we spent a night in a little town called Lone Pine and the next day we headed for Death Valley. I was a bit scared by that name! When we reached the edge of the Park, we saw signs warning us to make sure we had plenty of water and gas for our vehicle, because it is one of the hottest, driest, emptiest places on earth.

Death Valley National Park consists of 3,000 square miles of desert in southern California. Some plants and animals can live here because there is a little water. In an average year the floor of the Valley will have only around 4.5cms of rain, but the highest peaks have up to 45cms.
	Death Valley owes its name to a tragedy from the days of the Gold Rush. On Christmas Day 1849, about 100 men, women and children headed into the desert valley to take what they thought would be a shortcut to the Californian gold fields.
	They suffered weeks of starvation and thirst and split into several groups looking for a way out. Some were never heard of again, and those who survived came out ill and emaciated.
	In the summer, the temperature can reach 57 degrees C! The white area behind me in this picture is not a lake but a dry bed of salt that is below sea-level.
	Some birds and animals can survive even in this harsh climate and lots of flowers bloom when there is enough rainfall in the winter. This one is called the Panamint daisy and the flowers can be 5cms across.

 

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