California: Los Angeles, Channel Islands National Park, Lone Pine/Manzanar, Death Valley, and Vegas

Boat to Channel Islands National Park

In December, I took a vacation and went out to California.

Island Foxes at Channel Islands National Park

I took a day trip from LA to Channel Islands National Park.  It was wonderful.  I went on a kayaking tour of the sea caves.  To get there, I took a boat from Ventura Harbor (approx 90 minutes from LA) to one of the islands (approx 90 minutes on the boat).  On the way to the island, we saw whales, dolphins, and seals.  When we got to the island, my tour group got into our kayaks and kayaked through many sea caves.  The scenery was gorgeous, and we saw some sea lions while kayaking around.  After we got back to dry land, we did a short hike on the island.  Along the way, we saw island foxes - very small foxes that only live on the Channel Islands.

Trona Pinnacles

After visiting the Channel Islands, I headed to Death Valley National Park.  It is about a 6 hour drive from LA to Death Valley, but we made a lot of fun stops along the way.  We visited the singing road (it plays the William Tell Overture as you drive over it), Avenue of the Faces (a person's house with a lot of trees with faces carved into them in the front yard), a ghost town, the Trona Pinnacles, and the give and take sculpture.  The Trona Pinnacles were amazing.  They are really cool rock formations.  Many movies, including Star Wars and Holes, have been filmed there.  Note there is a large sign off the side of the road pointing one to the pinnacles.

On day 2, we woke up in Lone Pine, California and went out to see a rock painted like an angry face.  After this fun tourist attraction, we went to Manzanar to visit a Japanese Internment Camp from WWII (now a

Manzanar National Historic Site

National Historic site).  The tour was incredibly interesting.  It is well worth the trip.  Word of warning - it is VERY cold in the winter so dress warmly.  After Manzanar, we headed toward Death Valley.  We enjoyed scenic overviews while driving to the sand dunes.  We had a lot of fun playing on the sand dunes (rolling down them is more fun than sliding down them) before going to Badwater, the

Badwater

lowest spot on the continent.  On our way from Badwater to our hotel, we did a gorgeous drive along Artist's Palate.

On day 3, we woke up and went to Scotty's Castle.  We were a little skeptical about visiting a castle in a national park, but this was definitely a highlight of the trip.  After Scotty's Castle, we went to see Ubehebe Crater.  After that, we were going to drive to the Race Track (where you see rocks with trails behind them as though they have been racing across the desert).  Unfortunately, we did not have the appropriate vehicle for this drive.  After deciding not to risk driving to the Race Track, we enjoyed some tourist attractions along our drive to Vegas.

All in all, a great trip.