I recenly visited the Lone Pine Film Festival and stayed 4 nights at this motel. It is an excellent place to stay. Room was very nice and very, very clean. Excellent and fair price. Linda, who owns the place, is personable, friendly and helpful. Highly recommended.

We wanted to break up our trip to June Lake and saw the Den on the internet. When I called for reservations, Linda was so friendly and welcoming- it was a sure thing we were going to stay there. What a pleasant surprise! The rooms are super clean, cozy and comfortable, with some fun personal touches you don't find in road side motels. Linda is an awesome hostess and lays out a very nice continential breakfast for her travelers. We will always stay here again and again. Highly recommended.

I stayed at Ray's Den Motel on two different occasions in August 2010. It is an older (1940s?) motel on US 395 in Independence, CA. Its outstanding feature is its cleanliness, which was surprising to me for an older establishment. It is immaculate. The owner Linda (utterly charming, by the way) manages the motel and cleans the rooms herself. She honored my request for a quiet room and was very helpful with choosing local restaurants (there are not that many in Independence). The rate was reasonable, the rooms were a good size, and there was a good continental breakfast included. I will stay there again whenever I am in the area.

Independence seemed on the map the perfect stop before going to Death Valley in the morning - and it is somehow and somehow not - one thing is for certain: Linda is the fantastic host everybody talks about, expectations have been confirmed and stay was very fulfilling - for the hotel. The rooms were ultra-clean, not run-down at all, neat and really worked hard in detail and preservation. Shower had a dispenser for shampoo, lotion and soap: way to go in ecology! Little A/C really blowed well. I want to repeat myself: everything is very clean. Walls were thick and one couldn't hear the street outside nor any other noise.
Linda is a cordial talkative ready to help and makes you feel really welcome, value is good.
I only disliked one thing: I think it's rather sad that you're not allowed to smoke on the porch in front of your room (non-smoking inside absolutely accepted and reasonable), whether that may be law or not (Californian law to be certainly 10 feet away from your room or something of that sort), I have stayed at places that wouldn't care but were probably not as cute. We would have loved to chill on with wine and a few smokes on the appealing wooden bench.

BEWARE: The DOWNSIDE OF INDEPENDENCE: ..FOOD.
I didn't want to deduct rating from the hotel for it, but I want to warn everyone of the Hooligan's a few yards/meters south, it's a disgusting place, we had hair in our food and everything tasted either burned, unseasoned, overcooked or stale, and I haven't been expecting gourmet food. Pizza was as expensive as in any classy and acclaimed pizza place for disastrous quality and made us both feel uncomfortable for hours.
The highly-rated "Still Life" French place was closed and if I read some reviews here considering that I am European, I know that I would just leave and not wait hours as I think their policy of is overly self-assertive and honestly their menu hasn't appealed to me at all, I couldn't find really much French about it (steak and fries in some wine sauce = is that the French?) - nor do Salade Nicoise (Nice-style salad), onion soup or a brie sandwich impress me nor categorize it as authentic French since you can get this in nearly every restaurant or café all over Europe! So please consider this throughout your stay at Ray's Den or bring your own microwave burritos..or similar..
On the other side, luckily is her breakfast is kinda decent when not as spectacular as some have puffed it up. 3 points location is only the little-to-do-surrender of Independence and the fact there is not even a reasonable diner.