Cautions about Death Valley
I have been going to Death Valley for 30 years in the winter and wandering in the desert which is a very interesting thing to do. I have taken a TT once, but enjoy going in a pickup and remote campin...
Forum Discussion
older_fossil wrote:pnichols wrote:
Gary, the road in your Titus Canyon photos looks like it could be handled with a small Class C like you/we have.
Is that the case?
The Titus Canyon road goes through a number of different environments and conditions can and do change. The road is frequently closed if significant rain or snow has fallen (mostly because of Red Pass). I'd really only recommend a high clearance vehicle with good tires. The beginning of the road in Nevada can get fairly washboarded. A camper full of stuff would want to go very slow over that to avoid shaking things too much. Down in the canyon bottom we've seen fairly deep sand. Miller's Towing in Lone Pine has made large $$$$ recovering vehicles in the remote areas in and near Death Valley. We love driving Titus Canyon, but drive it in a Jeep.
UPDATE: While the music gets a bit monotonous, this Youtube video looks to reflect similar conditions to our last trip through Ttius Canyon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLsJ9wDEToc
My $0.02,
Art
Thanks much for the video link!
I just watched parts of it where they were enroute. The road in about the first third of the video looks like it's too narrow for a 101 inch wide Class C of any length ... my passenger (DW) wouldn't tolerate it ... and good luck if we would meet someone coming toward us (or is it a one-way road?). A short and narrow chassis Class C maybe could do this part of the route.
The road in about the second half of the video looks like it would be slowly and carefully doable in a short, 101 in. wide, Class C - but still with maybe an approaching vehicle problem.
IMHO a rig like the off-road Sportsmobile I linked to earlier in this thread would be my dream machine for traveling way out there and then camping there in complete non-minimalist comfort -> which is me in my post-backpack/post-vehicle-camp mode. I definitely don't care for getting out into the Far Side of Beyond in a supplemental vehicle and then having to backtrack, or otherwise leave, the area in order to get back to a comfortable camping vehicle before nightfall.
FWIW, I used to own an all-out V6 jeep CJ that could crawl up hiking trails and was also OK traveling under about 55 MPH ... but presented an intolerant nightmare when trying to drive to outback staging areas using regular roads/highways. ;)
