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| Trona Pinnacles is a national natural landmark 20 miles east of Ridgecrest. The rock formation developed between 10,000 and 100,000 years ago when the Searles Lake was still a lake with water. The formation needs an unusual combination of chemical conditions, which seems not so unusual around this area of Califonia. We saw this kind of formation before in Mono Lake. Rising out of the flat dry lake bed, these pinnacles somehow create a more striking landscape than the ones in the lake. | |
The ride to the pinnacles on the graded dirt road was quite
bumpy and somewhat nerve-wracking. You could see the tufas from afar, looking like some alien world. The white stuff on the
roadside is salt from the dry lakebed. |
 Getting close to the tufa, you could see these beautiful details of the formations. As barren as it looks, you could find quite a few plants growing here, even flowers if you looked closely (like this blossoming desert holly). |
 Don't these pinnacles look like Chinese scholars? |
 Sunset started an amazing transformation of these golden pinnacles. |