Badwater Basin sits at the lowest point in Death Valley (and North America). The surface is mostly what we would consider table salt (95% NaCl). The salt crystals have been left behind through a series of geologic events including the evaporation of a substantial lake that spanned 80 miles in length and was over 600 feet deep. The snow-white appearance can be blinding by the mid-afternoon Sun but looks like a beautiful blank canvas in the middle of the night. The hexagonal textures from the many evaporation and freezing-thawing cycles really come to life with just a hint of oblique ambient light and the ethereal glow of the summer Milky Way.