Places of interest in the Death Valley area Places of interest in the Death Valley area Places of interest in the Death Valley area are mostly located within Death Valley National Park in eastern California. Artist's Drive rises up to the top of an alluvial fan fed by a deep canyon cut into the Black Mountains. Artist's Palette is an area on the face of the Black Mountains noted for a variety of rock colors. These colors are caused by the oxidation of different metals (iron compounds produce red, pink and yellow, decomposition of tuff-derived mica produces green, and manganese produces purple). Called the Artist Drive Formation, the
Death Valley pupfish is 4 times more saline than the ocean, hot water up to , and cold water down to . This species is known from only two locations in Death Valley: Salt Creek (subspecies "salinus") at about 49 meters below sea level, and Cottonball Marsh (subspecies "milleri"), at about 80 meters below sea level. They are thought to be the remainders of a large ecosystem of fish species that lived in Lake Manly, which dried up at the end of the last ice age leaving the present day Death Valley. The Salt Creek subspecies is also found at River Springs and