Charlie Callagan, park ranger and naturalist, knows the rocks well. "You see the rocks and you see the tracks they left behind and it's obvious they've moved," says Callagan.

And there are no footprints, no tire tracks, no sign of someone moving them.

©Unk


Stonehenge, crop circles, nazca lines, UFO's...all great mysteries of our planet. Is there another to add to that list?

The mystery takes us to Death Valley, a land of contrast and mystery, of desert beauty, and stark reality to Racetrack Playa, high in the Cottonwood Mountains.

In the shadow of Ubehebe Peak where it's deafeningly quiet, except for the wind.

Still, the rocks move.

They move along a flat dry lake bed for no apparent reason.

Callagan says, "You know, you can imagine that full moon night on a halloween day and the goblins come out."

Don't believe in goblins?

"We're just not that far from Area 51 over in Nevada," hints Callagan. "I mean this is Death Valley, after all."

And, on top of that, Callagan adds, "No one has actually seen them move."

So, how do we know they actually move?

"It moves a little bit of mud in front of it and it leaves a trail. The trails have gone as far as half a mile...or sometimes they do a little zig zag," says Callagan. "I think 1200 pounds is the largest that they've ever estimated."

How? How could this be?

There now appears to be some answers.

Now, nothing would be more pleasing than to say that these rocks are moving because they're living little alien beings from another planet or because they're close to Area 51 and something strange is happening. But that is not the case. Science has found a logical explanation. However, that logical explanation is strange enough as it is.

It's believed high winds will move the stones.

We're not talking everyday wind; we're talking wind 60, 70, 80, 90 mph blowing up there.

"The playa is a very fine grained combination of silt and clay and sand and when it gets wet, it's extremely smooth," says Callagan.

It is a unique surface. and some, like photographer Tim Jones, who took pictures of the racetrack with a shallow surface of winter rainwater, believes when the surface freezes, the ice flow is blown by the high winds, moving the rocks along with it.

"Because there are tracks with two stones moving side by side and then turning and moving the other direction the same distance apart...one explanation is they were locked in the same piece of ice as it was blown by the wind," explains Callagan.

So why hasn't anyone seen this happen?

Callagan says, "The extreme harsh weather conditions...winter storms. The wind chill down to zero or below. No one's willing to sit up there under those conditions waiting for a rock that may or may not move for a year or more."

That's right. It's hard to predict when these stones will go strolling.

"Some years they don't move at all. Some years they can move several times," says Callagan.

But keep in mind the wind explanation is all just theory.

"Pretty definitive theories," says Callagan. "But no one has actually seen them move."

And that means...It is still, in reality, a mystery.

And Ranger Callagan says, "I'd almost be disappointed if someone actually had footage or saw them move because it would kind of change that mystery a little bit."

Callagan proudly says, "It's just one of those mystery's of Death Valley.