Sailing Rocks

Racetrack Playa at California’s Death Valley National Park is hard to get to but worth the effort. It is home to the famous sailing or sliding rocks. I’ve posted images of them here before but I wanted to bring a friend for her first visit. The 27 mile highly-washboarded road is teeth rattling but you must take your time.

The Racetrack from about 5 miles away. The elevation gain from one end to the other is a mere 1.5 inches and the Racetrack is almost 3 miles long. That is flat.

The road has views of mountain ridges and blowing sand.

No one really knows when Teakettle Junction got its start but is a quirky site in a quirky park

Sliding rock.

Lian trying to capture their story.

What probably is the cause

This lake bed gets baked by the summer heat of Death Valley

I made a trip this past week to the remote Racetrack Playa at Death Valley National Park in California. The road out there is a teeth-rattling 27 miles of washboarded surface. There were only a few other vehicles out there, this is not a trip for the meek. I was just happy that my Ford Ranger managed to stay in one piece, but barely.

Racetrack Playa is famous for its moving or sailing rocks. These rocks move without human interference on this extremely flat dry lake bed and leave a trail behind. Scientists believe the movement is produced by high winds when the surface either becomes wet or possibly frozen from a cold night.

You want to talk about flat! The Racetrack is 2.8 miles long but the north end is only 1 1/2 inches higher than the south end.

On this day, the winds were extremely strong with gusts up to 50 mph. It knocked over my camera and tripod at one point but I was there to catch.

Look for a future post where I actually capture the rocks MOVING in a time lapse video! Never been done before. Posts of Eureka Dunes, the Owens Valley and The Sierra Nevada’s will follow later this week.