Boron, Ca

We took a day excursion out to Boron, about 40 miles east of Tehachapi to visit the Borax Museum. We first stopped by the Saxon Aerospace Museum which is small but has some very nice displays. Then we stopped in town at another small museum, the Twenty Mule Team Museum, which was most informative. Here we learned that the movie Erin Brockovich starring Julia Roberts had been filmed here. Also the tv show Death Valley Days starring Ronald Reagan had made many people aware of this area.

From there we went to the Boron plant which has a museum also. We were quite surprised in a video they showed that so many products are made from borax. This is quite a major production in this small desert town.


It is hard to believe that a wagon such as this would make a 165 trek from the desert at Death Valley to take borax to the railroad junction located in Mojave. This took place from 1883 - 1886 and was a 20 days round trip. The mules were extremely well trained which was required to navigate through the mountains. The bells on the lead mules would signal ahead around curves to let oncomers know they were there.


We were visiting near the end of their workday and while we were looking over the mines they had set off a blast to evidentally prepare for the next workday.


From the top of the hill at Boron we could look across the highway at Rocket Mountain. This is a part of Edwards Air Force Base that has played quite a role in the history of the space explorations.


We then drove back across the Mojave desert, past the Joshua trees, past the wind turbines, and through the mountains to Stallion Springs Drive.