President Herbert Hoover established White Sands National Monument on January 18, 1933. Every year over 400,000 people from all over the world visit these awesome gypsum dunes!
White Sands National Park did not disappoint. The vastness of this fine white gypsum sand that comprises these dunes is incredible. I loved the contrast of the dark mountains in the background. The dunes cover 275 square miles, but you don’t have access to a majority of it. The dunes rise up 60 feet from the desert basin floor.
The HEART of the dunes: Pictures cannot do it justice. The dunes seem to flatten in the pictures. When in the heart of the dunes it is pure white glistening everywhere 360 degrees around you. It is so bright in the summer sun that I couldn’t tell what I was capturing in my pictures. I just hoped for the best.
White sands can be a fun place to sled down the dunes on a round plastic disc, but the sun was way too intense for us today. Plus the gift shop was OUT of wax. What’s the point without a waxed board? Who wants to keep stopping? We also expected the sand to be hot to the touch and ready to burn the bottom of our feet as it is on a typical beach with the hot sun beating down all afternoon, but it wasn’t at all! That was really neat to experience.
So where did this particular sand come from?
The massive dunes are created when rain and melting snow dissolve gypsum from the surrounding mountains and carry it into Lake Lucero, a seasonal lake. Desert heat evaporated the water, causing gypsum crystals to form. Dry winds expose the crystals and begin breaking them down (eroding) into tiny sand-sized grains that get blown into the dune field.
From nationalparks.org: “Beneath your feet is the glue that holds this vast dunefield together–water, inches below the surface. Compared to other dune types, gypsum dunes remain moist during the longest droughts. This moisture prevents the dunes from blowing away. Water becomes older and saltier toward the center of the dunefield. Scientists are woking to understand this change and other phenomena of this shimmering land.”
Below is the boardwalk area before reaching the heart of the dunes. The vegetation that is trying to adapt can be seen here. The soaptree yucca plant’s stem will stretch up to 30 feet to keep the plant from being buried in the shifting sands. But if the dune shifts enough to move on, the soaptree yucca cannot support this additional height, so it will fall over and die.
The bleached earless lizard below shows complete color adaptation to the white sand habitat. Note the “actual size” of the lizard in the bottom right area of the photo below. These guys are only two to three inches long. The Apache pocket mouse is another color-adapted animal in the area. Evolved to the lighter color allows them to stay cooler, and to be camouflaged from predators.
The lizard’s eyes work like sunglasses to protect against the bright glare of the dunes, and its toes are longer to help running on the sand.
Barry spotted one! I’ve circled it in the picture below since it blends in so well.
We saw several flying that were huge! I’ve never seen moths this massive. We had no idea they were moths! I thought it was a bird or small bat of some kind.
We began our visit at the official Visitor Center. There is an interesting, yet relatively short video to watch that shows how the gypsum sand forms, and gives more information about the vegetation and animal adaptations that have taken place. While the park itself opens at 7am, the visitor center doesn’t open till 9am. I enjoyed learning about the plant and animal adaptations that have occurred here, but really we mainly wanted to experience the full, shimmery white, crystal dunes barefooted. The summer sun gets extremely intense quickly, so to have more dune playtime, I suggest picking up a sledding disc at Walmart (much cheaper)…and get wax there, so you can go directly to the dunes at 7am. Drive to the heart of the dunes (the loop area where all you see is white all around you), and enjoy some sledding. Take LOTS of water. No water is available out in the dunes! After enjoying two hours of early morning sunshine at the heart of the dunes, go back and check out the boardwalk area, and then head to the air conditioned visitor center to learn more about the park.
This could be a fun place to bring Isaac and Mona someday. Till we come back again…