Badwater Basin
Hike Review
I hiked here a little more than a year ago, but the last time I was here, it was a salt flat. This time, due to historic rains, Badwater Basin was filled with water. Instead of a salt flat, what we found was a shallow, but large lake called Lake Manly.
Because there was too much salt and the lake reached peak salinity, there was plenty of salt at the bottom of the lake. Unfortunately, much of it was sharp and painful to walk on.
Splashing around in salt water meant that we came out with plenty of dried salt all over our bodies.
While there were a lot of people at the lake, most chose to walk to the water’s edge for pictures. Curiously, most did not go into the lake.
The bathroom was one of the most smelly ones I had ever come across and I didn’t even go inside.
What I Learned
We wore our Bedrock sandals, but since there were tons of sharp salt crystals on the bottom of the lake, many poked our feet as we walked around the water. A closed-toe shoe would have worked much better.
We knew about the lake, but we did not know that it would have a greenish hue when viewed from far away—green like an emerald.
It was very windy; so much so that on the drive to Badwater Basin, we saw clouds of sand cover the sky. But as bad as the wind was, it didn’t affect us in any meaningful way on this hike.
What Happened?
1.6 miles, 1 hr 6 mins, 13 ft of ascent
The main reason why we came to Death Valley was to see Lake Manly, a lake that was formed due to historic rains over the winter. The last time Lake Manly showed its face was 20+ years ago, so we felt compelled to experience the lake while we could.
We arrived less than an hour before the sun would hide behind the tall mountains west of Badwater Basin. We quickly put on sunblock, grabbed a bottle of water, and started our walk.
Much of the walk was familiar, but about a third of a mile into the basin, the ground turned muddy. It wasn’t fully muddy though, as there was a thick layer of salt above the mud that kept the ground flat. However, as we walked, more and more of the salt armor broke and the mud mixed with the broken salt. This was where we first encountered the sharp salt crystals that poked at our feet. We knew that our feet would get wet, so the water didn’t deter us. The stabbing pain, however, did slow us down and we carefully made our way to the water.
The lake was lukewarm and we walked until the water hit our ankles. At that point, the pain brought on by the sharp salt pieces got to be too much and we didn’t go much further. We kept shaking our feet so that we could vibrate the salt pieces off our shoes and into the water—it wasn’t very effective though. After a bit, the novelty wore off (and the pain continued) and since we weren’t going to go further into the water, we instead retreated.
The walk back was a bit more painful as I had a few open wounds at that point and the salt water stung whenever it touched. But since we were only about a mile out, it wasn’t so bad. At the parking lot, we washed our legs with the freshwater that we had. Because we have a nice spout at the end of ours, it was easy for us to wash off all the accumulated salt.
We headed out as the dark started encroaching on the warm earth. The drive over to Tecopa was a sandy affair and we ended up driving through a sand storm. It made these beautiful, ephemeral patterns on the road and that’s what led us out of Death Valley National Park.
