Today, I go to the Great Sand Dunes National Park. I've been particularly awaiting this visit as I've never seen desert before. I've seen near desert, like at the VLA, but never 100% sandy hills desert: it's an entirely new ecosystem for me to explore. On my way into the park, I spot a herd of elk about 400 yards away from the road.
After snapping a few pictures, I get in my car. Turning my head to see one last time, the entire herd is now running away. It's an amazing sight to see such a large group of animals moving so succinctly together all in the name of avoiding me.
This is what the dunes look like from far away. They're not quite as high as the mountains, but I can still tell they're not to be underestimated.
I head to the Visitors Center to ask whether tennis shoes or boots are best for the desert. The consensus seems to be tennis shoes. Sandals are frowned upon due to the heat the sands can reach, but aside from that, the lighter the better. Realizing this, I decide to greatly reduce the amount of equipment I take as well. It helps knowing there's no animal threat and little chance of getting cut since everything is made of sand, so I leave my knife and first aid kit behind this time. I also leave my main photo camera. I need to reduce weight and I have my GoPro, and since I'll be sandsledding, there's a good chance the photo camera could get broken anyway, so the rest of these photos are screenshots of my GoPro footage.
It's an odd feeling to walk out into the desert. It seems like there should be some dramatic music or an ominous voice telling you to turn around, but there's not. It's just you...heading out to the desert...to climb on some sand. It's the ultimate in exploration: you're just doing it to do it.
There was already a man near the top when I started towards the dunes. Approaching the first hill, I met a man at the bottom. He said he was waiting for his brother who was on top and must've been the man I saw.
The sand dunes look deceptively small. Until there's something to contrast depth-wise, you can't tell how huge they are because sand looks the same at most distances. For instance, I've outlined a small black spot in the picture above: that's the man's brother running down the dunes. Literally, I looked over and he was just running straight down the thing. He looked like some sort of sand puma. I'm still no sure how he didn't trip, but the point is, it's hard for me to believe just how far away he is in this picture when the sand itself looks so close.
Added to the weight of my normal equipment was the sandsled. The Kristi employee told me I'd probably need to wax the board every 2 or 3 slides (they provide the wax), but that it was really a matter of practicing a few times until I got the hang of it. Unfortunately, I'm trying to get to the top of High Dune, the second highest dune in the park. And from there, I'm possibly going to go to Star Dune, the highest. Not wanting to waste my energy going up and down the smaller dunes, my plan is to go straight up to the highest one and sled down from there, which means not a lot of chances for practice. So I find a little dip in one of the dunes and try it there...it doesn't go so well. I don't go anywhere and start acting like a little kid, kicking at the sand to slide me down a little bit at a time even though that's definitely not the way it's supposed to be done. I realize at this point the dune I go down is going to need a fair amount of slope.
To give you an idea of what it's like to walk in the desert, it's basically like walking at the beach but much steeper. I reach a point where other people's foot prints are extremely deep and think, “Man, they must've ran up this hill!” They didn't; climbing up it myself, I find out the sand is so soft that every step sinks my foot about 8 inches. Making the best of what I've got, I stab my sandsled into the ground and walk up that way.
Reaching the ridge of one of the larger dunes, I start to see what the Kristi employee was talking about. The half of the dune I climbed up was all sand but the half in the shade has a large amount of snow on it.
This is what it looks like to be at the peak of a desert. I climbed to the top of the largest dune I saw, believing it to be High Dune, but looking around, I can't see a taller one. According to the map, this should be High Dune, but if this is High Dune, I've got no idea where Star Dune is. I'm still not sure exactly where I was. But once I was up there, I took some time to relax and observe: there is nothing. The desert is absolutely empty. Every once in a while a breeze rustles my ears, but aside from that, there's no sound, no movement: I couldn't tell that life existed.
Getting over the existential bull crap, I get ready to do what I came here to do. I look at all slopes of the dune. The one that looks the steepest ends near some snow. It worries me a little after what the Kristi employee said, but there's no guarantee the others will actually move me considering how the test went. So I decide the steepest side of one of the largest dunes in a National Park ending in snow is probably the best place for me to sandsled for the very first time in my life.
For those who haven't seen it yet, here's the video of what happened.
For those who didn't watch, sandsleds can go FAST! Much faster than I expected. I'm not sure if I hit a dip, it was me trying to slow down before I hit snow, or something else all together, but this is more or less what happened:
I had no idea I would still have so much speed when approaching the snow, so I tried to prevent a crash which ended up causing a crash. I barrel rolled several times and when I got up, my water bottle and survival kit were strewn across the ground: the crash had busted one of my bookbag zippers. Getting up, I have to spit out sand and make sure the sandsled isn't broken; it's okay. I gather my things and repair my bookbag. Sledding down that dune was probably one of the best stupid ideas I've ever had: it was great.
As I leave the desert I try sledding down every dune I cross over. Shockingly, I can't do it. Every time I try, the board shifts left or right and I fall over: it seems the first try was beginners luck. The directed way to steer is to lean over, but eventually, I find a better way: don't hold on to the handles and drag your hands across the sand as the board starts to shift. Doing this gets me a few more good runs...
...all of which I end in the only way I know how.
Getting back to the parking lot, I realize how much sand I'm covered in. Here's me emptying one of my shoes:
I've heard removing pieces of nature from National Parks is against the law, but I'm hoping in this case they won't mind.
I return my board to Kristi Mountain Sports. Tomorrow is supposed to be a big day: I intend on visiting at least 4 different sights. My blog is way far behind though: if I don't take some time to catch up, I'm gonna forget what actually happened on the previous days. The ideal thing to do would be find a town on my way with several Starbucks that's also near a Rest Area, but that's asking a lot...and I'm lucky enough to find it almost immediately.
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