On Sept 18th we arrived at the city of Lone Pine, right next the Alabama Hills and Mount Whitney. Mt. Whitney is the highest summit in the contiguous United States at 14,505 ft. Our camp ground was called lone pine campground and was right at the base of this behemoth.
There was a very pretty creek right at the edge of our campground. Not too strange in a semidesert but definitely refreshing.
It was very cool and we used it to keep our drinks cold. It reminded me of one of the quotes from the Japanese at Manzanar. They said one of the only great things about living in such an awful location was the the water was always cool and refreshing. It was neat to think that I was enjoying some of the same water that they enjoyed some 60 years ago.
Here is Mt. Whitney with our campsite below.
Alabama Hills moon.
There is nothing like sitting out in the peaceful (almost eerie) moon lit dessert. I tried to capture it on film but it would be more beneficial if you could just be there.
Alabama Hills has long been a favorite filming location. Being about 3 hrs away from Hollywood, it is the ideal spot for westrens and mars adventure type movies.
I also happened to discover that every engineer's favorite movie was filmed here...IRON MAN!! At the beginning of the first movie Tony Stark goes over to 'Afghanistan' to demonstrate a new weapon. The backdrop was really the Alabama hills.
I give credit to this blog post for the location of this spot (GPS: N36 37.830 W118 07.315). They were filming in this very spot in April of 2007.
Shot from the actual movie. Pretty cool huh?
There was a camper that was at this spot a few yards away. Maybe he's an Iron Man fan too haha.
We also visited another spot that was in the movie. (Also credit to the same blog). GPS: N 36.5989 W 118.11614.
Apparently they edited out the sign that welcomes you to the Alabama Hills.
HI
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