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1. 

   “Death Valley SUV Trails: A Guide to 40 Interesting Four-Wheeling Excursions in the Death Valley Country” is the essential book about 4x4ing through the driest and hottest area in the United States. This is no ordinary trail guide. Roger Mitchell doesn’t simply describe road conditions. Instead, each entry is accompanied by detailed yet readable descriptions of each trail’s flora, fauna, geology and history. This multi-disciplinary approach makes for great reading. Having grown-up on the edge of Death Valley and published like-minded work since the 1960s, Mitchell writes with experience and extensive background knowledge. Indeed, the revised 2006 publication by and large replaces the author’s “Death Valley Jeep Trails”, “Inyo Mono Jeep Trails,” “Western Nevada Jeep Trails” and even 2001′s “46 Excursions.” While the traveler will still want the National Geographic Trails Illustrated map of the area, decent maps and black and white photos are included when appropriate. The scope is another benefit of this publication. Aside from the great internal adventures, “Death Valley SUV Trails” includes many of the great roads that snake in and out of the Park. This publication contains the 4×4 odysseys that start in Shoshone, Beatty, Scotty’s Castle, Ballarat and Trona. This quality work is accompanied with various appendices, an extensive bibliography and an index. The Mitchell Scale is the defacto standard in assessing the difficulty of dirt roads. Given the remoteness, ruggedness and enormous size, four wheel driving in this area is very dangerous. Don’t find out from experience why the place is called Death Valley. Get Roger Mitchell’s “Death Valley SUV Trails;” it is the single most useful guide to the National Park’s backcountry roads.

   “40 Excursions” (2006) replaced “46 Excursions” (2001). This review appears under the 2001 entry since there currently is no entry for the updated version. It is laughable that copies of the book are starting at $45.00 since the newest version can be had for twenty bucks at any regional gift shop or through the publisher’s web site (Track & Trail Publications).
   The Online Car Auction Rating: 5 / 5

   Comment by The Delite Rancher — March 17, 2010 @ 8:33 pm

2. 

   This book provides information on a large number of great trips in the Death Valley area. I’ve personally used this book as a guide for several trips and have found it to be reasonably accurate (which is difficult considering the constantly changing conditions in the Death Valley area). The author provides a lot of extra information pertaining to human and natural history which adds to the interest of the trip and gives ideas for further research. The author has also written several other useful guides which are also very useful.
   The Online Car Auction Rating: 4 / 5

   Comment by blackturtle — March 17, 2010 @ 10:15 pm

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