Tecopa

First stop is Tecopa Hot Springs, and after checking into the Resort which looks, on the outside, like a Hitchcockian motel, but on the inside has a bright mineral bath attached to the room, we walk the 75 feet to what looks like a truck stop, but bears the evocative painted sign "Pastels Bistro."

Richard Bangs: Death Valley Daze, Part II Richard Bangs 2011

With an early start we made it to the Tecopa Hot Springs Resort for lunch, a busy outpost a couple miles off State Highway 127, just east of the southern end of Death Valley.

Richard Bangs: Death Valley Daze, Part I Richard Bangs 2011

With an early start we made it to the Tecopa Hot Springs Resort for lunch, a busy outpost a couple miles off State Highway 127, just east of the southern end of Death Valley.

Richard Bangs: Death Valley Daze, Part I Richard Bangs 2011

First stop is Tecopa Hot Springs, and after checking into the Resort which looks, on the outside, like a Hitchcockian motel, but on the inside has a bright mineral bath attached to the room, we walk the 75 feet to what looks like a truck stop, but bears the evocative painted sign "Pastels Bistro."

Richard Bangs: Death Valley Daze, Part II Richard Bangs 2011

We raided the polyunsaturated goodness of the snack aisle of a Quik Stop on the outskirts of Tecopa, which was more or less the last call for calories, gas, and restroom facilities.

Thin Air Rachel Caine 2007

First stop is Tecopa Hot Springs, and after checking into the Resort which looks, on the outside, like a Hitchcockian motel, but on the inside has a bright mineral bath attached to the room, we walk the 75 feet to what looks like a truck stop, but bears the evocative painted sign "Pastels Bistro."

The Full Feed from HuffingtonPost.com Richard Bangs 2011

Cynthia's 2001 Old Spanish Trail Highway, Tecopa; 760-852-4580, www. discovercynthias.com.

The News Tribune Blogs newstips@thenewstribune.com (JESSICA GELT; Los Ang 2010

Hotel-owner Cynthia Kienitz's four-month-old blue Weimaraner, Blue, rests beside the fire in the dining room of the cottage during breakfast service at Cynthia's in Tecopa, Calif.

The News Tribune Blogs newstips@thenewstribune.com (JESSICA GELT; Los Ang 2010

Cynthia's 2001 Old Spanish Trail Highway, Tecopa; 760-852-4580, www. discovercynthias.com.

The News Tribune Blogs newstips@thenewstribune.com (JESSICA GELT; Los Ang 2010

We felt especially relaxed because Tecopa has no cellphone reception, and we were savoring our enforced shutdown.

The News Tribune Blogs newstips@thenewstribune.com (JESSICA GELT; Los Ang 2010