Mojave (Shallow Thoughts)  Akkana's Musings on Open Source,
Science, and Nature.  Fri, 01 Apr 2005   The East Mojave
National Reserve is the nation's newest member of the national
park system, signed into law as one of President Clinton's final
acts. Growing up in LA, I'd driven through various parts of the
Mojave desert since I was old enough to drive, but I hadn't been
there since the park was created, and I didn't have much idea
what specific interesting places might be there, except for
Kelso Dunes, distantly visible from the interstate near Baker
and always intriguing on our previous trips.  But where to go? I
had no information about what was where, just an auto club road
map and the topographic map collection I've been using to work
on my pytopo program. The road map had ranger hat symbols at the
town of Baker, at Mitchell Caverns down at the south end of the
preserve, and at an obscure intersection of two minor roads in
the south-central part of the reserve.  Dave didn't want to go
to Baker -- it's a