Category: Death Valley

Between starting a new job & taking some delightful journeys in our new Airstream, we’ve been remiss in actually updating the ol’ Micronaxx blog. So as not to let April get away entirely without an update, I’ll mention some highlights from my inaugural outing with Finn & the trailer—the gallery from which you can see here.

“MNK” (Margot Nack’s Kid), as he’s known, was an incredibly resourceful, level-headed companion on what was inevitably a slightly intimidating outing towing more than 3,000 pounds of bucking metal behind us. Happily we were able to overcome a few teething problems and make our way safely out to the desert.

Highlights included:

• Glimpsing a rare lake (!) in the driest place in North America. All those early-year rains made for quite the sight of kayakers paddling around the foot-deep expanse. Compare that to my previous visit with Henry, during which we crunched around the dry lake bed with our vintage Lego spacemen & simulated the lunar surface.
• Camping in a 31-person town that featured a single restaurant staffed by “Stressed Uncle Ted” (as Finn dubbed him), the one-man waitstaff.
• Catching a beautiful sunrise at Zabriskie Point, then driving up to the funky communities of Beatty, NV & Goldfield, NV (home to outdoor sculpture gardens, art cars, kooky locals, and free-range donkeys).
• Checking out The International Car Forest (see link in case the animation below doesn’t play), where Hen, Sarah Murray, and I had photographed fire breathers back in 2022.
• Hiking up to “The Star of Siam,” which Finn & I had previously summited with our friend Maria back in 2017. I think he found the climb far more tractable at age 16 than at age 8!

Anyway, check out the gallery if you’re feeling it, and here’s to many more epic roadtrips with the fam!

[Galleries: Trains and Spacemen]

Our second full day of desert adventures saw us awaken from a fairly brutal night. I’d been unable to locate our campsite, leading to lots of circling in the dark before finally, in desperation, picking a bare patch of gravel.

Mercifully Hen had long since nodded off, but the next hours featured me struggling to sleep on the van floor before he woke up & we stretched out the bed. (Oddball upside: Spotting a midnight coyote patrolling the campground just a few feet from us.) Little did I know that our cousin Sarah Murray was sleeping not more than a few campsites away—but that’s a story for another day!

We skedaddled down to catch some morning light on an old engine of the Death Valley Railroad, bringing our Lego selves & engineers in tow.

We followed up by making the most of the tourist-gouging breakfast buffet, carrying off approximately 936 buttermilk biscuits. Hen kinda overdid it, as you can see in our gallery. 😛 Now suitably refueled, we explored the nearby visitors center & ruins of some old borax works

Soon after, our Adobe friends began to roll in, and we strategized about our photography plans at Badwater Basin, the nearby dry lake. Hen had thought ahead & brought along a collection of vintage Lego spacemen & vehicles, including a number from my childhood. It was particularly special to me that Henry chose to include a moon buggy through whose windows I remember peering up at the stars while my mom drove us home from Rockford, circa 1981.

While our friends conducted an eye-popping photo shoot with a talented acrobat performing handstands atop a stack of chairs (!)…

…we enjoyed ourselves creating a lunar exploration. Check out the full gallery from the outing!

Last week’s journey out to Death Valley marks the first time I’ve headed that way without the family or friends. The endless desert drives were made less lonely, however, as I’d reach into my pocket to feel the reassuring jangle of the “Nanonaxx”—little Lego copies of the four of us + Seamy.

As you can see in this gallery, I had fun posing them everywhere from sand dunes to a salty seabed to the top of a little peak. Check it out!