
moderate
11 hours
Suitable for people in average fitness; most stops require short, easy walks but long seated stretches on the vehicle.
Leave Las Vegas for an 11-hour small-group trip that pairs Death Valley’s surreal landscapes with a desert sunset at Zabriskie Point and stargazing in a certified Dark Sky Park. Expect salt flats, panoramic viewpoints and a guide who ties geology and history together.
You leave Las Vegas as the city exhales its neon, the highway stretching into the high desert as the strip lights shrink in your rearview. By late afternoon the bus dips into a landscape that seems to have been pared down to rock, salt and sky. At Zabriskie Point the color of the badland folds deepens as the sun tilts west; ridges take on the kind of detail only a desert can invent. When darkness falls, the Milky Way detonates overhead—an impossible ceiling in this International Dark Sky Park.

Bring 2–3 liters of water per person—the bus stops don’t replace personal water needs and summer temperatures soar.
Wide-brim hat, SPF 30+ sunscreen and UV sunglasses are must-haves; shade is scarce at major stops like Badwater Basin.
Temperatures drop quickly after sunset and at high viewpoints like Dante’s View—pack a warm jacket even in summer evenings.
Use red-light flashlights during stargazing and avoid white lights to preserve night vision and the park’s Dark Sky status.
Timbisha Shoshone people have inhabited parts of Death Valley for centuries; 19th-century prospecting and borax mining reshaped settlement patterns and left historic artifacts across the valley.
Death Valley is a protected National Park and certified Dark Sky Park—stay on designated routes, pack out trash, and minimize light pollution during night visits.
Staying hydrated is critical in extreme desert conditions.
summer specific
Protects against intense desert sun during midday stops.
summer specific
Evenings and high-elevation viewpoints are noticeably cooler after sunset.
night|winter specific
Enhances stargazing—helps pick out planets, satellites and the Milky Way.