#mojave-desert

Radar

The Radavist 2023 Calendar: January

“Mojave” is the first layout of the Radavist 2023 Calendar. We’re now in our tenth year of doing calendars! It was shot with a Sony A9ii and a Sony 70-200 lens in California’s Mojave Desert. Photographed by John Watson.

“Spend enough time in dry and arid places and you’ll welcome weather events. As a storm system rolled in where John and Cari were camping for New Years Eve, they received quite the light show…”

For a high-res JPG, suitable for print and desktop wallpaper*, right-click and save link as – The Radavist 2023 – January. Please, this photo is for personal use only!
(*set background to white and center for optimal coverage)

The mobile background this month is a vertical crop of this photo. Click here to download January’s Mobile Wallpaper.

Reportage By: Jeremiah Bishop & Jake Orness

Impossible Route: Yuma to Bishop via Death Valley

February 28 – March 8, 2021
February 27th
Arrival in Yuma, Arizona

The Impossible Route team arrived about as prepared for it as a groom to a shotgun wedding.

We planned on paper, but this was the Mojave Desert and Death Valley; and they would definitely hold some big surprises.

Radar

Evan Weselmann’s ‘Desert Trip’ for the Radavist

We’ve always got something fun cookin’ up over here at the Radavist and recently, Minneapolis-based artist Evan Weselmann reached out asking if we need any illustration work. Once seeing his portfolio, I knew exactly what we could task Evan with. I sent him our Death Valley bike tour photo gallery from 2019 and requested that he take inspiration from that. He delivered an insane graphics package and this illustration is but one tile in his multi-page package. With cooler temps on the way, I thought it’d make sense to ask y’all what you’d like to see from us this fall/winter season. Long sleeve t-shirts? More Nalgenes? You know what products we stock, so let us know what you want and we’ll do our best to deliver. You can ignore the background image, I just wanted to ground the drawing a bit.

We’re all looking forward to the ‘Desert Trip’ capsule collection! Drop us a note in the comments.

Reportage By: Josh Becker, Mike Thomas, & Matt Miller

Sand and Snow: Bikepacking to the Salton Sea from Palm Springs and Then Some!

The Salton Sea first appeared to me back in 2016, a couple of days into the Stagecoach 400 bike packing trip with the Borrachos. It appeared to me then as it appeared on this passage, an out of place body of water in the desert landscape, planar and mirage inducing. It could have been the heat exhaustion the first time I saw it, but the sea seemed to bend the horizon. We only saw it in the distance at that time, as our Stagecoach route took us up and away into Anza Borrego. This time around though, we’d pedal straight for it.

Radar

The Radavist 2019 Calendar: December

This is the twelfth layout of the Radavist 2019 Calendar, entitled “Mojave Mob” shot with a Canon 5D and a 70-200 lens in Death Valley National Park, California.

“Our trip through Death Valley National Park was one of my favorite stories of the year and with it, came many memorable moments, but this one image really resonated with me, even after editing, culling, and selecting hundreds from over a thousand photos. Enjoy…”

For a high-res JPG, suitable for print and desktop wallpaper*, right click and save link as – The Radavist 2019 Calendar – December. Please, this photo is for personal use only!
(*set background to white and center for optimal coverage)

The mobile background this month is a layered blue hour ombré fade, complete with the lilies of the desert, the joshua tree. Click here to download December’s Mobile Wallpaper.

Reportage By: John Watson

Deserted, Dusted, and Dolomite: A Central Death Valley Bicycle Tour

The cold. Oh, the cold. Never before had I experienced 10º temperatures at night and 70º during the day. There I lay, in chrysalis, asleep in my bivy thinking to myself, “this is miserable.” That was two years ago, at the foot of the second tallest sand dunes in North America, nestled between the Last Chance and Amargosa Mountains in Death Valley National Park. Needless to say, it took a while for me to want to tour this unforgiving place again. There’s something transformative about touring in the Mojave Desert. The dryness, the elevation, the sand, the silt, the wind, the washboard roads; insurmountable obstacles really bring out the truest human condition, that Lovecraftian urge to get out and test one’s limits. Push it a little bit further and come out the other side. Had I known that this love for the deserted, the dusted, and that grandiose dolomite was merely biding its time as I shivered uncontrollably in my bivy sack two years ago, I might not have been so absolute in my cynicism. It was time for emergence.

Radar

The Radavist 2019 Calendar: February

This is the second layout of the Radavist 2019 Calendar, entitled “Inyo Ascent” shot with a Canon 5D and a 100-400mm lens in Keeler, California.

“We’ve got a project coming up this month, that’s all about going up, up, up, into the Inyo Mountains. Here’s a teaser, about halfway up a 5,000′ ascent. It keeps going after this!”

For a high-res JPG, suitable for print and desktop wallpaper*, right click and save link as – The Radavist 2019 Calendar – February. Please, this photo is for personal use only!
(*set background to white and center for optimal coverage)

The mobile background this month is of one of our favorite set of switchbacks in California. Can you name that climb? Click here to download February’s Mobile Wallpaper.

Radar

Enjoy the Weekend

… and the long road ahead.