Death Valley Images
CSULA Geology Club
Refer to this map We camped at Mesquite Springs (for reference).
Part II The Drive in to Race Track Playa
The road into the Race Track Playa, although unpaved, is a good one. The Cambrian dolomite however creates a particularly irritating road dust. The Snowline (The El Nino storms had barely materialized yet) was just above the Joshua Tree upper limit. Many of the limestone ledges in the Cotton Wood Mountains (see the great MAP I found on the WEB) had a light powder on the way in.
Dr. Dave Mayo proudly displays the avalanche breccia that lines the pass on the final assault to the Race Track. The avalance breccia is an assortement of angular carbonate clasts that were transported over a wide area eminating from an escarpment above the road and subsequently recemented from the influence of carbonic acid in meteoric water. Dr. Mayo refused to disclose how much dynamite was required to accomplish this particular avalanche.
This is a view to the North, after going over the previous pass. Teakettle Junction Vicinity just north of the Race Track Playa. Plenty of limestone out there. Last Chance Mountains in the background (I think). Some of the Limestone's and Quartzites are intruded by granitic rocks and there are contact metamorphic auroles containing copper ore ( malachite and azurite on quartz ), as well as granoblastic marble, beautiful quartz and garnet crystals.
This was is just West, overlooking the Playa. Here is a boulder of amphibolite, the mountain above is composed mostly of a hornblend bearing alkali granite. There are granoblastic marble where it contacts the limestone and further north, where we stopped for lunch, were quartzites (metamorphosed siltstone) bearing Almandine (?) Garnets and Copper Carbonate Carbonate Hydroxides (Malachite and Azurite). I'm not lear on what it was that was being mined in these abandoned mines. Maybe someone at Cal state LA can tell me if I have my facts straight on this area?
Here is a look over my shoulder, a wide perspective of the playa from in the same wash.
Another birds eye view of the playa. Note the bouldery looking outcrop to the left (North). Although I personaly didn't make it out there (due to no non diligence or laziness on my part of course but rather to time constraints imposed on us by our fascist leaders). Dr.Bishop reports that it is an outcrop from the same several small plutons that I'm standing on here on the west side of the Race Track Playa. An "Inselberg" perhaps?
I don't dare proceed much further up. The Geology Club might leave me here to die if I don't return to the vehicles.
This is the End of Part II
Continue onward, and treck onto the Playa itself in Part III --------------->
Dr. Dave Mayo proudly displays the avalanche breccia that lines the pass on the final assault to the Race Track. The avalance breccia is an assortement of angular carbonate clasts that were transported over a wide area eminating from an escarpment above the road and subsequently recemented from the influence of carbonic acid in meteoric water. Dr. Mayo refused to disclose how much dynamite was required to accomplish this particular avalanche.
This is a view to the North, after going over the previous pass. Teakettle Junction Vicinity just north of the Race Track Playa. Plenty of limestone out there. Last Chance Mountains in the background (I think). Some of the Limestone's and Quartzites are intruded by granitic rocks and there are contact metamorphic auroles containing copper ore ( malachite and azurite on quartz ), as well as granoblastic marble, beautiful quartz and garnet crystals. 
This was is just West, overlooking the Playa. Here is a boulder of amphibolite, the mountain above is composed mostly of a hornblend bearing alkali granite. There are granoblastic marble where it contacts the limestone and further north, where we stopped for lunch, were quartzites (metamorphosed siltstone) bearing Almandine (?) Garnets and Copper Carbonate Carbonate Hydroxides (Malachite and Azurite). I'm not lear on what it was that was being mined in these abandoned mines. Maybe someone at Cal state LA can tell me if I have my facts straight on this area?
Here is a look over my shoulder, a wide perspective of the playa from in the same wash.
Another birds eye view of the playa. Note the bouldery looking outcrop to the left (North). Although I personaly didn't make it out there (due to no non diligence or laziness on my part of course but rather to time constraints imposed on us by our fascist leaders). Dr.Bishop reports that it is an outcrop from the same several small plutons that I'm standing on here on the west side of the Race Track Playa. An "Inselberg" perhaps?
I don't dare proceed much further up. The Geology Club might leave me here to die if I don't return to the vehicles.