White Sands National Park
On Feb 28th (Happy Birthday Ashley!), we packed up the van and headed out of Texas. Thirteen hours later, we were finally out of Texas. We frontloaded our 21-hour drive time because we wanted to wake up in a city called Alamogordo, NM - a fairly depressing place. We chose Alamogordo as a stopping point because it's adjacent to the White Sands National Park, which Elliott wanted to visit.
There weren't many options for accommodations in Alamogordo, and I picked a mid-priced motel called The Classic Desert Aire Hotel. It was an uncomfortable night, and it made me appreciate the attention to detail I had taken for granted at a string of La Quintas on the way to South Padre Island. Elliott went for takeout at the best restaurant in town (Chili's), and we each got between 4 and 6 hours of sleep. . . total. I had a pretty bad dream about snakes, and Elliott said I jumped on the bed and yelled. Nice.
I have to say, though, that our trip to White Sands National Park made the long drive and sketchy accommodations worth it. WOW, what a place. It's 275-square mile gypsum dune field that started out as a lake a few hundred million years ago. While the name "White Sands" is both reasonably descriptive and highly accurate, it doesn't match the beauty of this place or the awe that it inspires in visitors. These days, there isn't much that could get me excited about the prospect of playing in sand, but that's exactly what I wanted to do. Imagine sitting on a pure white landscape in the middle of endless, undulating dunes, completely alone, letting fine, white sand run through your fingers. It was kind of magical. The feeling was only partially overshadowed by the panic that ensued when I realized I had no cell signal and no idea where I was in relation to the car. There are orange posts in the ground that serve to guide hikers, but it's easy to lose track of where you came from. I was eager to confirm that other people also get lost in the park, but a quick search for statistics was permanently interrupted when I found and became fascinated by a partial White Sands National Park incident log.
Here are few excerpts:
“When [the hiker] failed to show up and did not return at dusk, the park was notified and a search was begun. K.M. was wearing shorts, a tank top and a cap, but was barefoot. The search ended just after midnight when a very sore-footed K.M. walked into Ratscat, a secure military facility on the White Sands missile range about eight miles north of the point last seen.”
"[White Sands National Park] received an advisory to be on the lookout for a black Jeep Cherokee with two juveniles on board - a 14-year-old girl and a 17-year- old boy - who were believed to be heading to the park from east Texas. The Jeep had been taken without permission from the boy's father, and the girl was entered in NCIC as a runaway. The next day, ranger Maijala spotted and attempted to stop a Jeep matching that description which was speeding on a park road. The driver of the Jeep refused to stop, however, and a chase ensued which reached speeds of 90 to 100 mph."
"[White Sands National Park] learned that two visitors who had been hiking within the dunes since noon were lost and unable to find their way out. R.V. and K.R., both of Oklahoma, left to go hiking with their three dogs, Stitch, Suzy, and Griswald. After finding a suitably beautiful spot within the dunes, R.V. proposed to K.R. The newly engaged couple than attempted to hike back to their car, but were unable to find their way back. Rather than continue to wander becoming more lost, they contacted a cousin via cell phone and requested that help be sent. While two Army Rescue Blackhawk helicopters were en route from Fort Bliss, approximately an hour away, Holloman Air Force base diverted an F-22 Raptor from a training mission to the search effort. The pilot of the Raptor was able to positively identify the couple with their three dogs. The hikers and their dogs were transported by the Army Blackhawks out of the dunes to the command post, where they were examined by NPS and Alamo West EMS for exposure to the below freezing nighttime temperatures. K.R. accepted R.V.'s marriage proposal. The newly engaged couple invited the Blackhawk crew to the wedding."
THE DRAMA!!!
A week later, I was still shaking sand out of my shoes, and I didn't even care.
During the summer months, White Sands National Park leads night hikes during full moons. Our stay in New Mexico was too early in the season to participate, but I have to imagine it's worth planning a trip to correspond with this experience. I feel like it would be like looking at the moon FROM the moon.
I left the park feeling really grateful for Elliott and his desire to see as much as possible on our journey. When I travel, I feel a strong urge to just get where I'm going. Detours and delays usually make me anxious. But I would have missed so much had we pushed straight through.
Shortly after leaving the park, we started to see more really interesting topography. In a rare practical application of all the geology courses I took in college, I told Elliott that it almost looked like a volcano had just erupted. And I was right! That is, if you consider an eruption 1000 years ago to have "just" happened. The Carrizozo volcanic field is one of the largest in the world. It's part of the Rio Grande rift zone, where two of the earth's plates pulled apart. How is it that the same geological event can create one huge area of pure white and one of darkest black that are nearly touching? I must have missed that day of class.
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