Set your sights on Gunsight Pass Traditional Cache

These coordinates will lead you to a challenging geocache, just off 190, in Gunsight Pass, about halfway between Lone Pine, California, and Darwin Road.

Several parking turnouts are conveniently located for the cache hunter on the go. No need to waste time jockeying for a parking space closest to the cache.

Only a quick hike is needed!
A quick hike in beautiful desert backcountry will lead you to the cache. Whether you're on the way to Death Valley or heading into Lone Pine, close proximity to the road makes this cache easy, but a short walk in the pristine backcountry makes it interesting.

The terrain is rocky, but no boulder scrambling is necessary. In fact, if you mentally subtract the few plants in this area and add a reddish cast to the landscape, this area looks downright otherworldly, almost like something you would see in a photo beamed down from the two NASA rovers on Mars.

The cache is about a quarter mile from the road, the perfect distance to stretch your legs a bit before continuing on to a tasty breakfast at the Totem Cafe in Lone Pine or to work off that tasty breakfast you just had at the Totem Cafe in Lone Pine.

Looks like a Gunsight
The cache is located on the fringes of the Malpais Mesa Wilderness Area in Gunsight Pass at the southernmost end pf the Inyo Mountains.

Gunsight Pass is not marked on any map, but it is a well-known local landmark. It is called "Gunsight Pass" because it looks like a gunsight when you approach it heading toward Death Valley. If you approach it from the other side -- heading toward Lone Pine -- it just looks like a road cut through some otherworldly volcanic lands, so you'll just have to take my word for it looking like a gunsight, although you could look at it through your rearview mirror after you have successfully found the cache and are discussing with your fellow cache hunters what a great cache it was.

The cache is conveniently located for the cache-hunter on the go, the cache-hunter who is eager to pick up a challenging quickie and doesn't want to spend a lot of time detouring miles off course, and then wandering every whichway through trackless backcountry. You can easily access this cache if you're on 190 coming from Olancha, heading to Death Valley, Darwin, Saline Valley or Panamint Valley. It's just as easily accessed coming from Lone Pine. Conversely, you can pick this one up if you're coming in from Death Valley or Panamint and heading back to civilization and points south through Olancha or heading up north through Lone Pine.

Be careful pulling on or off the road!!
Please be careful pulling on and off the road in the Gunsight Pass geocache parking area. The road narrows at this point, and views of oncoming traffic may be obstructed to some degree. There are MANY foreign tourists going and coming to and from Death Valley along this road. Invariably, they either drive too fast or too slow. In either case, they are usually watching the scenery and not the road.

Here are just a a few of treasures in the cache container, a round snappy cookie tin with a national park motif:

• An always-popular lizard girl action figurine.
• A hard drive, stuffed with a plethora of interesting and potentially embarrassing data.
• A genuine no-expenses-spared antique Kodak camera filter in antique art-deco bakelite case.
• Meade "mystery" power-zoom binoculars. (They are "mystery" binocs because it is a mystery how to get them to work.)
• Three (count 'em -- three) Vicoprofen ballpoint pens. (Leave one for cache finders to write with please). Vicoprofen is a high-power painkiller with the same active ingredient as Vicodin.
• A hotsamba.com lanyard.
• Last but not least, the best prize of all, a rapidly blinking LED complete with batteries. This sucker is so bright that you can't drive at night with it on your dashboard.

Have fun and let me know how you made out!

UBeHEbe JeeBEE