Trona Pinnacles National Natural Landmark

We almost zoomed past the Trona Pinnacles National Natural Landmark on the way to Death Valley National Park on the Christmas holiday without stopping.  That would have been a big mistake because only seven miles off of State Highway 178 on a dirt road is an amazing discovery that will look eerily familar to many Americans as the setting to many popular movies such as Planet of the Apes, Star Trak V, and Lost in Space.  Independent film buffs may recognize the landscape as the setting in the 2005 critically acclaimed film by David Fenster named Trona, in which man finds himself mysteriously planted in this crazy desert land stripped down to his underwear and finds the true pleasures in life.

This Bureau of Land Management road is passable by regular two wheel drive passenger vehicles as long as there have not been heavy rains.  However, the road is very rough in places so you should drive very slowly to prevent damage to the underside of your car.

As soon as you start down the road, the view of the surrounding mountains takes your breath away.  Trona Pinnacles are the Searles Valley between the Argus range to the west and the Panamint range to the east.

 The Argus Range looks painted with pastels from all the minerals.

Spangler Hills are interesting because upon a close inspection, you can see horizontal cuts where the shorelines were during the various Ice Ages.  These marks are called tattoos and they give valuable evidence as to what this land looked like during the Tioga and Tahoe Ice Ages.

The snow capped peak is Telescope Peak in the Panamint mountains that are within the boundaries of Death Valley National Park to the east of Trona Pinnacles.

The train pictured here is on the shortest regulated railway track in the United States.  The trains haul out valuable minerals to be processed in the town of Trona, which you can see in the background, is busy at work.  Out of the 104 known naturally occuring chemical elements, 98 of them are found on the Searles Dry Lake, making this the richest chemical store in the world.

Coming up to the first set of Pinnacles is exciting.  These pinnacles are known as the Middle Group.  The three distinct groups of pinnacles were formed during the past three ice ages ranging from 10,000 years ago to 100,000 years ago.

We are only seeing a small portion of the more than 500 pinnacles that are preserved here.  To see the Northern Group and the Southern Group, you need to hike out.

Signs explain how the tufa pinnacles were formed.

These crazy looking shapes are not the result of erosion like many found in the desert Southwest, such as hoodoos found at Bryce Canyon National Park.  Instead, this entire Searles Valley is an ancient sea bed. 

During the three Pleistocene Ice Ages, glaciers covered the nearby Sierra Nevada mountains, shaping Yosemite National Park.  Water run-off from melting snow spilled down to form a chain of inland seas including Mono Lake, Death Valley's Manly Lake, and this one, Searles Lake.

The ground water under Searles Lake is full of calcium.  The water runoff from the glaciers on the Sierra Nevadas was alkaline.  Spires made from calcium carbonate, also known as tufa, formed in the areas where the ground water was springing into the lake.

Pinnacles are categorized into four basic shapes: Towers, Tombstones, Ridges, and Cones.  Towers are the most impressive with their taller than wide shape shooting up into the sky as many as 40 feet.

Tombstones are the shorter, wide formations and are usually 20 to 30 feet in height.

A ridge is the most impressive of them all.  The Middle Group, where the road loops through, has two beautiful ridge formations.  These giant tufa stones have many peaks and pinnacles.

Rock climbers love to challenge themselves on these formations and even though the Trona Pinnacles were almost deserted on the day we were here, we still saw some brave people climbing to the top of this ridge.  One ridge is 800 feet long, 500 feet wide, and 140 feet tall.

This fellow's exurberance as he makes it to the top is apparent to us even from far below.

Cones are the smaller, bumpy formations: anything under ten feet tall is classified as a cone.  They may have been bigger before, but wind and sand are a constant eroding force in the Southwest deserts.

If you use your imagination, you can see shapes in these formations.  This one looks like it belongs on Mount Rushmore.

This one looks like Buddha to me.

 These formations used to be called "Cathedral City" because of all the spires.

For an out-of-this world experience, I highly recommend a trip out to the Trona National Natural Landmark.

Next time I am out this way, I'm going to plan on spending the entire day so that I have plenty of time to explore the Northern and Southern Groups.

If you get the chance to travel California's Scenic Highway 395 on the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevadas, take a short side trip at Ridgecrest on California 178 to Trona and be sure to see this place.