This is a nice loop in the Panamint Mountains in Death Valley National Park - but actually done from the Panamint Valley.
The loop starts out near Ballarat. The obligatory
google map is here.
A nicer map of the area with trails is here. The Pleasant/South Park loop is near the bottom of the map:
This loop has a bit of everything. Desert running, boulder scrambling, drives along stream beds, old mines, wide open valleys with wild burros, pine forests, expansive views of butte valley and panamint valley, steep sided canyons, the works.
The trail up Pleasant Canyon starts in
Ballarat Ghost Town in the southern and eastern part of Panamint Valley. Very much dry desert. Here's some of the local flora:
Some short distance up the trail, the trail merges with the stream that carved the canyon. This is no place for paint scratch wusses
:
Along the way, you'll see remnants of mines and of vehicles that plied the trail in busier days:
Hopefully my vehicle was not to join them:
In the winter, the upper parts of Pleasant Canyon see snow:
Right at the top, you enter pine forests:
Head 'em off at the pass:
The view into Butte Valley:
At the top of South Park Canyon, the terrain opens up into wide and flat plains:
Wildlife includes burros:
South Park then narrows again on the way down:
More brush to worry the paint:
Continued in post #5...
